Getting Serious
by ICanStopAnytime
Summary: A Tami and Eric backstory that begins with Tami's first year of college.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** _This story was drawn from a longer work I removed from the archives a couple years ago to salvage parts for a book I was working on at that time, so large parts of it may be familiar to those of you have read my stories for a long time. If you haven't seen it yet, or want to read it again in its new form, I hope you enjoy. Comments welcome._

 **Chapter One**

"This is getting serious," Tami's mom said as she basted the turkey.

Tami was setting the table. It was her first year of college, and she'd come home to North Dillon for Thanksgiving.

"What's getting serious?" Tami asked.

"You and Eric. Him here for Thanksgiving. You planning to spend winter break with his family in Odessa."

Eric was still a senior in high school. They'd begun dating toward the end of his junior year, but over the summer his family had moved to Odessa and she'd gone away to college. They'd continued to maintain a long distance relationship.

"What do you want me to say to that, Mom?" Tami asked.

"Well, you could either confirm or deny."

Just then, Tami's 8th grade sister walked in the kitchen. "Eric won't let me watch _Magnum, P.I._ ," Shelley complained.

"It's just a re-run tonight," her mother said.

"You can lust after Tom Selleck another time," Tami told her.

"It's not Magnum I like," Shelley insisted. "It's Rick. And Eric won't let me change the channel! He's just watching some stupid football game." She grabbed a can of Sprite out of the fridge and started shaking it up.

"What are you doing?" Tami asked.

"Just going to offer Eric a coke." And then she walked out of the kitchen.

"Tami," her mother said, "you make sure your sister doesn't ruin my carpet now."

Tami left the half-set table and stormed to the living room. She stopped Eric in the nick of time, grabbing the can from his hands before he could open it. "Why don't you help me set the table?" she asked him.

He motioned to the TV. "It's not even half time yet."

When they'd first started dating, he'd have done anything just to spend time with her, just to be near her. "Really?" she said. "You're going to choose a televised game over my company? When we haven't seen each other in weeks and won't see each other again until almost Christmas?"

He stood up, but he looked over his shoulder at the TV as he followed her to the kitchen.

At dinner, Tami's mom gave Eric the honor of carving the turkey. She asked Shelley to say grace.

"Dear Lord God," Shelley said, "thank you for all this grub. And thank you that Mom won't let Eric sleep here tonight, so I won't have to watch football all freakin' night long."

"Shelley!" her mother scolded. Ms. Hayes had said no to overnight guests, so Eric was staying with a high school friend, a teammate from the time he'd lived in North Dillon.

Shelley continued her inappropriate prayer despite her mother's admonishment: "Even though he and Tami are probably just going to find some other way to get horizontal."

"Shelley!" It was Tami yelling her name this time.

"Amen," Shelley said.

When they started passing the plates, Eric's face was a near match for the beets.

 **[*]**

Tami broke away from Eric's lips. He was leaned back against his truck, his hands on her back. "You better get on over to your friend's house," she said.

"Why doesn't your mom just let me sleep on the couch tonight?"

"She doesn't want you sneaking into my room."

"After what Shelley said at grace…she's got to know."

"Yeah," Tami agreed. "But this way I think it's easier for her to lie to herself about it."

"I'll pick you up for breakfast at 6 tomorrow. We'll hit the diner. Then we can go _park_ down by the lake."

"It's cold, Eric. It's been a cold November."

He kissed her and murmured, "I'll warm you up." When she sighed, he said, "What's wrong?"

She shrugged. "I don't...It's just….It just seems like you're just interested in getting laid."

He dropped his hand from her back and hooked a thumb through his belt loop. "Damn, Tami. It's been _weeks_ since we've seen each other!"

"I know, but…you're just going to screw me in the bed of your pick-up tomorrow and then head back to Odessa to get ready for your game. You drive up here, and all you do is watch football all day."

"I'm taking you to breakfast tomorrow! And I didn't just watch football all day. I ate with you guys. I cleared the plates. I took out the trash."

"And then went back to watching football. "

He shook his head and paced away. He put a hand on the hood of his truck and looked at her with disbelief. "You know, you _could_ come down with me to Odessa tomorrow. You could come to _my_ game. It's a big game."

"You know I can't! You know I have to drive over seven hours to MWU and that I have that study group first thing Saturday morning. "

"Yeah, I _know_. I _understand_. I don't accuse you of just wanting to get laid and move on."

She crossed her arms over her chest. She felt like crying. Maybe she did cry, because he took her in his arms. "Can't we just have a good day together tomorrow?" he asked. "Please? Breakfast? The lake? Make _love_?" he usually said _fool around_. "I've missed you so much."

She didn't know why she was so emotional. He'd been faithful. He called her every other day, even though the charges had to be eating away at his savings. He even wrote her once a week: short letters, corny and sweet. She kept them in a shoebox. "I'm sorry," she said. "I guess I just…I've missed you. This is a lot harder than I thought it would be. This long-distance thing."

"I know," he whispered.

"And I'm sorry I'm not making your big game. It's just, I really need to attend this study group to be able to ace that math test. I have a C+ right now." It was a stupid Calculus class she had to take as a prerequisite for statistics, which she had to take if she wanted to be a Psychology major.

"I know. It's okay. You can come see us when we go to State."

She smiled. "You're pretty sure about that, huh? When did you get so cocky?"

He nuzzled her cheek. "When I convinced the prettiest girl in Texas to be my girlfriend."

"Either that or when you became the first string quarterback of a team that's had an undefeated season."

"Or when UT-Austin started knocking on my door."

She pulled back. "They have?"

"Oh yeah. Some time now."

"You'll go, won't you?" UT was his father's alma matter, and two and a half hours away from her school. That was a lot better than the seven and a half hours between them now. Not to mention that it had a good reputation for both academics and football.

"I don't know. I haven't committed to anything yet. I'm just gonna let them keep sweetening the pot…"

She smiled and kissed him. "We don't _have_ to wait until tomorrow morning, you know. Once my mom goes to sleep, she's out like a light. She goes to sleep by ten. And I'm on the ground level. I can let you in through the window."

"What about Shelley? Is she out like a light?"

"Ugggggg!" Tami threw her head back. "I forgot about Shelley."

"We could wheel the TV in her room, give her a bag of chips, and let her watch _Magnum, P.I._ re-runs."

Tami laughed. "I guess we better just stick to the original plan and go to the lake tomorrow morning." She kissed him teasingly. "Dream about me tonight."

"I always do." He resumed kissing her, but he stopped suddenly and lifted his eyes over her shoulder.

"What?" she asked.

He nodded in the direction of the house.

She turned to look behind herself and saw Shelley with her face pressed up against the kitchen window. "I better go in."

"Tell Shelly goodbye for me," he said. "And that I'll really miss her."

Tami laughed all the way back to the house.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

All the waitresses in the diner recognized Tami because her mother worked there, four nights a week, from 8 to 12, on top of her other job. Tami knew Mom needed the money, but she wasn't sure it was such a good idea for her to leave a 13-year-old Shelley home alone in the evenings. Tami's sister was not known to practice the best judgment. Of course, neither had Tami when she was her sister's age. She hadn't really started to develop good sense until she was almost 17. She could only hope Shelley would do the same.

Eric pushed the bowl of cream across the table to her, and she poured one in her cup and stirred.

"Well if it ain't Eric Taylor." Tami turned to see Joey, one of Eric's old teammates on the North Dillon Pirates, that one year he had lived here. Eric's father, an Athletic Director, was always moving for better jobs, but also for better football teams for Eric.

Eric smiled and slapped Joey's extended hand. "Hey, man. Heard you got moved up to QB1."

Joey nodded. "Heard the Wildcats made it to playoffs. Thanks to you. Good luck Saturday." He smiled at Tami. "Hey, Tami." Joey had asked her out the day she dumped Mo McArnold, but by then, her heart was already set on Eric, who had been a real friend to her, encouraging her to apply to college and pursue her dreams. "How's college?"

"Good."

"Lots of wild parties?" Joey asked.

"I don't really have time."

Joey nodded again. Eric gave him a look that seemed to say – _Get lost. I'm with my girl._ Slowly, it registered, and Joey said, "Well, see you around."

"So…" Eric said. "Is that true? What you told Joey? You aren't going to parties?"

"I went to one last Saturday night after work, for a couple of hours."

"You…uh….dance with anyone?"

She smiled. It was a bit of a relief to witness his insecurity. He was a year younger, and at first he'd been the one to pursue her - albeit subtly - but with the distance between them now, and his growing popularity as first string quarterback of the Wildcats, she sometimes feared they'd drift apart. It was comforting to see he was maybe as worried about losing her as she was about losing him. "No. I just played poker with some guys."

"What _kind_ of poker?" he asked tensely.

"Strip poker."

He was silent.

"I'm _kidding_ , Eric. I'm joking. We played nickel poker."

"I bet those guys loved you, though, huh?"

"They did. Until I took all their money."

He laughed. God he was cute when he laughed, she thought. She reached across the table for his hand. They were just lacing their fingers together when the waitress interrupted them to take their order and top off their coffee cups.

They went back to holding hands when she was gone. "Haven't seen you smoke since I've been here," Eric said.

"I quit."

"Good. How'd you manage that?"

"I was never _that_ into it." She'd done it to rebel against her mother's strict religious views and to look cool. She'd never much liked it. "And you have to sign a paper at MWU that says you won't smoke or drink. Not that anyone honors it. But…I'm done with the smoking."

Eric talked excitedly about his upcoming playoff game for awhile, but then he suddenly asked, "Do you mind if I go to the winter dance the first week of December? This girl needed a date. We'd just go as friends, of course. I've told her all about you. She won't try anything, I promise."

Tami felt suddenly cold. She drew her hand away from his. The waitress arrived and set their food down.

Eric picked up his fork. "Tami, is that okay with you?"

"Sure," she lied. "What's her name?"

"Kimberly."

Every fourth girl Tami had met at college was named Kimberly, if she wasn't named Jennifer. She'd met a few other Tammy's, but they always spelled it with the y, not the i. "Is she pretty?"

"No. She's not."

"Liar."

"Actually, Tami, she's not. She's kind of…homely. I told you she _needed_ a date."

"So…what? You're being chivalrous?"

He sighed. "Girls can be such bitches to each other."

Tami had seen her share of cattiness in high school. She'd expected college to be better, especially an all-girls Christian college, but in some ways MWU was just the same old high school bullshit with a larger vocabulary. There were sororities, and off-campus parties, and rivalry for boys at the community college around the corner, and jostling for position, and backbiting. Classes were far more interesting, but the group politics were about the same, as far as she could tell. She went to the occasional party and she had one study buddy, a sort-of friend who was also on the volleyball team with her, but she was lonely.

Tami didn't feel like she fit in there. She'd been popular in high school – Homecoming Queen, the girl half the football team wanted to date. At MWU she was nothing but an above-average student and a mediocre volleyball player, "that Tammy girl, you know, Amy's roommate, the one who's always studying." Maybe she shouldn't have gone to an all-girls school. Yet she loved the psychology program there, the way it seamlessly combined theory with practice.

"Explain," she said.

"Ah…these cheerleaders. There's two of them who think it's kind of fun to…you know…make fun of this girl. Because of the way she looks."

"Bitches," Tami agreed. Even when Tami was a bad student who snuck out of the house and smoked and went farther with boys than she'd really wanted, she'd never been one of those mean girls. She didn't form female friendships easily, but she also didn't tend to earn the resentment of the other girls.

"Anyway…they thought it would be funny if they made her ask me out. They sort of dared her, with a threat - do this or we'll do this other thing to embarrass you even more. I heard about it from John Paul."

John Paul was one of Eric's first cousins, the only one of the six boys who went to the same high school as him. Two of his cousins were at a private Catholic school, one was in junior high, one was in college, and the sixth was working full-time as a mechanic.

"So when she asked," Eric continued, "knowing those girls were trying to humiliate her, I didn't say no. I said I would think about it."

"So you really _were_ being chivalrous."

"I guess. You're really okay with it?"

"Yeah. Sure." This time, she wasn't lying. "I wish I could see those cheerleader's faces when she shows up at Homecoming with the West Odessa Wildcats' hot new star quarterback."

Later, after breakfast, they parked by the lake and snuggled together in a sleeping bag in the bed of his pick up truck. They left the window open to let in some air, but he had a cover, so they had some privacy. The lake was largely deserted, anyway, because of the cool fall temperature. You never knew what you were going to get in Texas in the fall - it could feel like spring or even summer some days - but today it was only 40.

They kissed slowly for a long time, but eventually Eric snaked his hand under her sweater and unhooked the front clasp of her bra. She gasped when he began to toy with her breasts. "You like that?" he asked.

"Mhmmm…" she murmured. "I love your touch, sugar." Eric liked verbal assurances when they were fooling around, she knew. He was less experienced than she was. Despite being good-looking, and a good football player, he'd been shy, and moving from school to school every year of his high school career hadn't helped. He'd had only one girlfriend before Tami. She moaned when he pinched her nipple. "Yes. Just like that," she told him. "Do that again."

"Yeah?" His breath was heavy in her ear. "You want this?"

"Mmhmmm," she whimpered.

Their clothes got jumbled in the bottom of the sleeping bag, and they rocked together in its soft enclosure, warmed by skin against skin, until she moaned his name in the midst of her release, and he cascaded over after her saying, "Damn, Tami. Damn."

She curled against him as they caught their breath. "I missed you," she whispered.

He smiled. "No kidding. That was…that was…"

"Maybe we should always only have sex once every few weeks."

"No."

She chuckled and kissed his cheek.

He turned and looked at her. "I love you," he said.

"I love you, too."

"But…"

"You have to start driving. You have a game tomorrow. And you probably have to meet with the team tonight."

He nodded.

"And I have to start driving to MWU."

"Only a little over three weeks until your winter break," he assured her.

"I'll be counting the days."

[*]

"Mail," Tami's roommate Jenny announced as she dropped four envelopes on her desk next to the electric typewriter Tami's mother had given her as a graduation gift. "Including one from that boyfriend of yours."

Jenny flopped down on her bed and opened a magazine. "Why are you still with a high school boy, anyway? There are plenty of hot college guys at University of Houston."

Tami tore open the letter. "Trust me, Eric's plenty hot. He's a quarterback. His team is going to the State Championships in a couple weeks."

"I prefer baseball players. My God. Those arms."

"Eric has spectacular arms."

"Well I guess I've got to meet this guy of yours." Jenny flicked a page in the magazine.

Tami unfolded the letter, which was handwritten in Eric's wide, somewhat messy cursive.

 _Dear Tami,_

 _So the dance went well. I think Kimberley had a good time. Those mean girls kept looking at us with their mouths open. The only bad part was when one of them came over and asked if I was gay or something. John Paul laughed and said, "Or something." Then he made a point of dancing with every single girl but them. He may not play any sports, but the girls all love him. I guess they think he's really good looking or something. Plus I guess they like that he can sing, even if it's in the school musicals. Anyway,_ _it was kind of fun. But I wished I was dancing with you instead. Can't wait to...dance...when you come to Odessa._

He'd underlined dance three times and then signed the letter Love Eric XOXOX.

She always wished his letters were longer, but he'd never been one to mince words, and he wrote them faithfully. She folded it up and added it to the others in her shoe box. Then she took out a sheet of paper and wrote him one back, two pages - both sides.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

When Tami stepped off the plane at Midland Airport three weeks later, Eric was waiting for her with a small bouquet of flowers. Her car was being repaired at a shop in Houston, after an accident for which she was not at fault, and she'd resorted to flying. Tami felt fairly confident about her finals, which she'd taken early, and she was looking forward to a much needed break before next semester.

As they were walking toward the airport parking lot, hand-in-hand, Eric said, "It's about twenty minutes to my house in Odessa. I've got two more days of school before winter break, but I can bike and you can have my truck during the day. I'll leave you the keys."

As he turned on his truck later, he said, "You'll have the guest bedroom. It's downstairs, and mine's and my parents' are upstairs." He put his arm behind her seat as he backed up. "I'll sneak down there. I have to set the alarm for 5 though. My dad's up at 5:30."

"So you're just assuming we're going to have sex tonight?"

He threw the truck into drive. "Uh…"

She smiled. "I'm teasing. Of course we are. But you could romance me first."

"I brought you flowers."

She sniffed the bouquet. "They're lovely. But did you handpick them from the side of the road, looking for only the best?"

He half turned to her and then turned back to look as he exited the parking lot to the road. "Are you serious?"

She laughed. "No. How's your dad liking his job?" Last summer, Mr. Taylor had secured a position as Athletic Director at West Odessa High School. "Still having problems with the baseball coach?"

"Nah, he worked that out I think. It's weird going to the same school where he works, even if I don't see him that often. He's usually in his office." Tami put a hand on Eric's thigh. He kept talking. "So, Friday I leave on the team bus. You'll be driving with my parents. Sorry about that." The Texas State Championships were being held in a college stadium about an hour's drive from Odessa.

"Well, your mom likes me at least." Eric's father, Tami thought, merely _tolerated_ her. "It won't be _too_ awkward."

"I'm nervous as hell."

She could tell. He'd hardly noticed where her hand was, and he was looking intently at the road as he drove. "You're going to win this thing, you know," she assured him. "I know you, and you're going to win this thing."

A few minutes later, he pulled into the parking lot of an Italian restaurant. "I'm taking you to dinner. We're going to celebrate."

"You getting to go to State?"

"That and also….I made a verbal commitment." He turned off the truck, came around to her door, and opened it.

She kissed his cheek after she got out. "You're going to be a Longhorn?"

He closed the door, put his hands on her hips, and pushed her against the truck. After he'd kissed her deeply, he said, "You're going to like this. Houston Cougars."

She squealed and jumped. "UH is just twenty miles from MWU!" Next school year, they could potentially see each other _every day_ if they wanted to.

"I know."

"But…I thought UT-Austin was trying to recruit you."

He shrugged.

"You didn't turn them down for _me_ , did you?"

"Tami, I'm going to play a lot better if I can see you more easily."

"You've been playing pretty well this season. Maybe you need to see me _less_."

"Not possible," he insisted.

"How does your dad feel about it?"

"He thinks I'm making a huge mistake. But it's not his decision. I've thought about this. UT's got a strong quarterback, and he's only a sophomore. I'll have more of a chance of _actual_ playtime at UH. If I don't get played, I don't get recognized. Grady's at UH, and he's my best friend after you. And you'll be close by. They offered me a full scholarship with books, housing, and meal allowance for every year I play."

"What if you get injured?"

"Then I can keep the scholarship until the end of that year."

"Then you lose it?" she asked.

"I'm not getting injured."

"What did UT offer you?"

He kissed her. "I'm gonna be a Cougar. That's it. End of discussion." He took her hand and tugged.

"You're sexy when you're assertive," she said.

"Yeah?" he smiled as he put a hand around her waist and led her to the restaurant. "You like that?"

 **[*]**

When they got into Eric's house later that evening, Mrs. Taylor greeted Tami warmly, while Mr. Taylor nodded perfunctorily. Eric's mother showed her to the guest bedroom to deposit her things, and then led her back to the living room. When Mrs. Taylor sat down next to her husband, Tami was once again struck by the physical contrast between them. Mrs. Taylor was pale and petite – 5'6" and slender, with reddish-blonde hair, pale skin, and sparkling green eyes. Mr. Taylor had thick, black hair, dark eyes, and an almost Spanish complexion. He was a towering 6'2" and broad-shouldered, such that he looked every inch the offensive tackle he'd once been, for two years, in the AFL.

Mr. Taylor spoke little and soon retreated into his study to work, while Mrs. Taylor remained in the living room, quizzing Tami about her life. "How are you liking college?" she asked.

"Okay," Tami answered. "I've already decided I'm majoring in Psychology. I haven't picked a minor yet though."

"You might consider a minor in education or child development," Mrs. Taylor said. "I mean, if you have any interest in being a school guidance counselor."

For some reason, that wasn't something Tami had considered. She assumed she'd be counseling adults, but hadn't her own high school guidance counselor made a difference in her life? Where would she be today without that woman's advice? Mrs. Harrison's encouragement, along with Eric's, had helped her turn her grades around and get into college. "That's actually a good idea, Mrs. Taylor."

"Call me Betty," she said. "And you can call Eric's father James."

Eric laughed. "Yeah. I'd like to see his face when you try that."

 **[*]**

Tami looked down at the comforter shifting and rolling as Eric made his way down beneath it, trailing ticklish kisses over her bare stomach. She'd gone to bed naked, in anticipation of him sneaking down later.

She was giggling until he pushed her legs open and tasted her with a flick of his tongue, and then she gasped and clutched the comforter, balling it in two hands.

He was really good at this. Tami didn't know why he was so good at this. He'd only had the one serious girlfriend before they'd started dating.

"God yes," she murmured. "Oh, please."

[*]

The next morning, Eric rolled out of Tami's bed at 5 AM, kissed her, and snuck back upstairs. When she finally pulled herself out, showered, and got dressed, he had already left for morning practice before school.

Mr. Taylor was sitting at the breakfast table reading the newspaper. She was surprised he hadn't left for work yet, and she felt a little uncomfortable to find herself alone with him. While he'd never been rude to her, Tami got the impression that Mr. Taylor didn't like her much.

He lowered his paper. "Good morning, Tami," he said. At least he'd stopped calling her _Ms. Hayes_ , the way he'd done when they first started dating and all summer long.

"Morning, Mr. Taylor." She motioned to the coffee pot. "May I?"

"Of course. Cups are in the cupboard to the left of the stove. There's still bacon in the pan. I left you a plate."

She filled her plate with the three remaining slices, poured her coffee, and sat across from him at the table. "Don't you have to be at work?"

"I stayed late yesterday. I don't have much work this morning. I'll go in eventually."

"Where's Mrs. Taylor? Still sleeping?"

"She went to that nursing class _you_ persuaded her to take." Eric's mother had quit her nursing job when he was born to be a stay-at-home mom, but she was preparing to re-enter the workforce now that he was in his last year of high school.

Tami smiled lightly. "I'm sure she makes her own decisions." They'd had a conversation over the summer, in which Mrs. Taylor mentioned feeling listless and worrying about her impending empty nest, and perhaps Tami had _suggested_ she resume her former nursing career.

Mr. Taylor closed his newspaper and set it on the table. He studied her. "We don't need the money," he said. "I've always provided for this family."

"I don't think she's doing it for the money."

"It's going to _cost_ money at first. All these refresher courses she's taking."

"It'll pay for itself in time," Tami told him.

"Like your psychology major? Is that going to be worth the thousands in tuition?"

"I have a full scholarship, actually."

He drummed the newspaper with his fingertips. "How did you manage that, with your grade point average?"

"It's needs-based."

"Ah, yes, I forgot that those of us who live frugally and save for our children's educations are punished for our fiscal responsibility."

"My mother lived frugally. But it's hard to save when you're supporting two children with one income on a high school education. And isn't Eric getting a football scholarship?"

"Yes. I'll be transferring part of his college savings to one of my wife's nephews."

"That's generous of you."

"They have seven children now in that family. A bit irresponsible if you ask me, but my wife expects us to help them."

Tami had always thought it a bit odd that the Taylors only had Eric. Mr. Taylor was so very _Catholic_. Mrs. Taylor seemed less so, but her family was religious. She wondered if there were fertility issues, but of course she wouldn't dare ask that.

Mr. Taylor stood and picked up his plate and coffee cup. "Well, I have to get to mass."

"It's Wednesday."

"I go every morning."

"Oh."

"Not something you Baptists would understand, I suppose."

"I'm Methodist, actually." Tami's mother was devoutly religious, a teetotaler and women's Bible Study leader and Sunday School teacher. She volunteered regularly at their church, which wasn't easy to do as a single mother who worked sixty hour weeks. Tami's father was still alive, somewhere, but he never sent money. Tami's mother liked to keep busy – like her daughters, she was a ball of energy, but, unlike them, she didn't have much of a social life. She and Tami's father had never officially divorced – Tami's mother had just kicked him out for his drinking and gambling and cheating and told him to come back when he was "right with the Lord." That was nine years ago, and he hadn't gotten right yet.

"Still going to church at college?" Mr. Taylor asked as he put his plate and cup in the sink. He didn't wash them. Tami supposed he left that for his wife to do.

"Well, MWU has chapel. Once a week. It's required." If it hadn't been, Tami wasn't sure she would bother.

"I can't persuade Eric to go more than once a week. Or my wife for that matter."

Tami was a little surprised he didn't simply demand they go. He'd always seemed a bit authoritarian to her.

"Eric left you a house key on the counter," he told her as he grabbed his briefcase from where it rested on a kitchen chair. "Good day." Mr. Taylor left and shut the kitchen door.

Tami looked around the empty kitchen and wondered what to do with herself until Eric came home.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

That evening, the Taylors had a big backyard barbecue with Mrs. Taylor's brother and sister-in-law and their gaggle of children, so Tami finally got to meet Eric's extended family. It was one of those random, sunny, 68-degree Texas December days. It would probably drop back down into the 40's tomorrow.

Tami sat next to Eric's Aunt Mary and Uncle Andrew in some lawn chairs and watched Eric play football with his six male cousins, aged twelve to nineteen. She thought her sister Shelley would probably explode if she was here, watching those boys play. They were all of them good-looking: lean and blonde and blue-eyed, with perfect teeth and adorable dimples every time they smiled. Eric was like the black sheep of the family out there, his mop of dark brown hair rising above the sea of blonde every time he leapt for the ball.

Eric's Aunt Mary was holding her infant daughter cradled in her arms, and Eric's Uncle Andrew had his arm around her shoulders. They were watching their older boys and laughing with each other about their kids, and once the uncle leaned over and kissed the aunt on the lips, right there in front of Tami. Tami had never seen anything like that: long-married adults acting almost like teenagers, not ashamed to be affectionate in public. Her parents had certainly never acted that way, even before her mother had kicked her father out.

"Andrew," Mr. Taylor said from behind them. "Come help me get the grill started. I need to pick your brain about something."

Eric's uncle rose.

Eric ran over, his long-sleeve t-shirt clinging to his muscular chest, and took his uncle's vacated chair. His aunt handed him the baby, and she went to join Mrs. Taylor, who had just come back out of the house with two glasses of ice tea.

Eric cradled his baby girl cousin. He looked adorable with that baby in his arms. "I bet you'd make a good father," Tami said.

"What?" His eyes were wide and alarmed as he glanced at her belly.

"Relax. You know I'm on the pill."

"Shhh!" He glanced toward his parents, but they were a long way off.

"I just meant _someday_ ," she said. She put a hand on his neck and toyed with his hair. "Don't you want kids someday?"

"Sure. When I'm established, but I certainly don't want seven like my aunt and uncle. They're good Catholics. I'm a bad Catholic."

She laughed. "You're good, Eric. You're a good _human being_."

He smiled and put his pinky out and the little girl grabbed it and immediately drew it into her mouth. "Whoa, Maggie," he said. "Ease up on that." Her full name was Mary Magdalene. His cousins all had names like Nathan Gregory and Peter Francis and Philip Andrew. "How did you end up being named Eric?" she asked.

"There was a St. Eric," he said. "He was never officially canonized, but he was important enough to get beheaded."

She laughed.

He pulled his finger out of Maggie's mouth and played with her hands. The baby gurgled, and Eric smiled.

Tami wondered how far off in the future he saw marriage. Would he want to get married when he finished college? A few years after he graduated? At all? Would they even be together a year from now, after he became a college quarterback and was surrounded by all sorts of fawning college girls?

John Paul ran toward them and came to a dead stop in front of Eric. "Come on, man. We need you. Stop flirting with this beautiful girl and get back out there." He winked at Tami.

Tami chuckled.

"Stop flirting with my girlfriend," Eric said, handing the baby to Tami and standing up. "And maybe I won't kick your ass."

"I'd like to see you try," his cousin said, and they ran out a few feet and started wrestling.

Tami shook her head. "Boys," she said to the baby Maggie. "They can be such idiots." She looked over at Eric, who was laughing as his cousin tried to put him in a chokehold. She smiled. "Such charming idiots."

When the scuffling boys had broken apart, they started playing football again. Eric's aunt sat down next to Tami and reclaimed the baby, while Eric's uncle left Mr. Taylor at the grill and joined the boys to play.

After a few minutes, Eric called across the yard, "Dad! You wanna play?"

Mr. Taylor shook his head. "Tending the grill, son," he said.

Eric frowned. He looked around at his cousins, playing with their own father. He missed the football when John Paul tossed it to him. It hit him straight in the chest.

Tami got up and walked over to the grill. "I'll take over," she said. "You go play with your son."

"I should really tend these burgers," Mr. Taylor said.

She plucked the spatula from his hand. "I can handle it. Go play with your son."

"Very well," he said. "We all like them medium rare, except my sister-in-law – she likes hers to be a hockey puck."

Tami smiled. "I'm on it."

Eric smiled as Mr. Taylor jogged out to join the game.

 **[*]**

The Texas 5A State Championship drew enormous crowds, so Tami wasn't at all surprised that her cheating ex-boyfriend Mo McArnold should be at the game, but she was surprised to find him so near to her in the stands. Eric's family had especially good front row seats, but Mo was a mere four rows behind them. He clamored down the bleachers before kickoff and squeezed himself between Eric's cousin John Paul and Tami, who were sitting before the rail. John Paul eyed him suspiciously.

"Hey, Tami, long time no see," Mo said.

If Tami had discovered Mo was cheating _before_ her heart had already half bent toward Eric, the wound might have run deeper, but she felt little resentment toward him now. "Yep. How's A &M?"

"I'm tearing it up on the Aggies." That's not what she had heard. She'd heard he was warming the bench. "So," he asked, "why are you rooting for the Wildcats tonight?"

"You know why. Eric's their quarterback."

"Huh. You two still together?" Mo glanced out on the field. "Long distance is a bitch, Tami. You don't really think he's not banging one of those cheerleaders, do you?"

Tami gripped the bleachers, the cold metal chilling her palms. John Paul leaned forward and peered at Mo. "My cousin's not a cheater."

Startled, Mo glanced at him. John Paul extended his hand. "John Paul."

"Mo McArnold."

They shook hard. A little too hard. Tami sensed a pissing match coming on and tried to deflect it. "So, Mo, why are _you_ rooting for West Odessa?"

"I'm dating this girl whose little brother is a linebacker." He glanced up a few rows, waved at a pretty blonde, and smiled.

"So, you and the whore you cheated on me with didn't work out?" Oh, why had she done that? She was beyond that. She was better than that.

John Paul's blonde eyebrow shot up.

"Oh, Tami," Mo said, "you knew that was nothing. I told you that was nothing. That was never going to be anything. _You_ were my everything, you know."

She rolled her eyes and John Paul narrowed his. Eric's sixteen-year-old cousin Philip Andrew, who was on the other side of John Paul, and who had oddly brought a book with him to the game, looked up from his reading and peered at them too.

"Game's starting soon," John Paul said. "You best get back to your girlfriend."

When Mo was gone, John Paul glanced up to where he stood in the bleachers. "Pretty girl," he said. "She deserves better."

"You're not going to try to steal Mo's girlfriend, are you?" Tami asked.

"Did I mention I'm considering A&M?"

"No you're not," Philip said, closing his book and slipping it inside his coat. "They don't have nearly as good a theater department as UT-Austin."

"Yeah, but I didn't know A&M had girls who looked like _that_."

They stopped talking because of the kick-off. The game was slow moving, and by the end of the half, the teams were tied 7-7.

As the band began to march, Philip Andrew sat down and pulled out his book again, while John Paul made his way up the stands to where Mo, apparently in search of food or a bathroom, had left his girlfriend alone.

Tami sat down next to Philip. "What are you reading?" she asked.

" _The Practice of the Presence of God_."

"Uh…okay." Well, that wasn't going to be much of a conversation starter. She wasn't sure where to run with that. "Do any of your brothers play football?"

"Stephen Patrick does," he said as he turned a page, "for his middle school. Nathan Gregory did, when he was in high school." Was Nathan the mechanic, or the one in military college? She couldn't keep them straight. She knew John Paul, because he'd harmlessly flirted with her for the past two days, and she knew Philip Andrew, because he was peculiar. The rest were a blur of double names.

After that, Philip Andrew became immersed in his book. Nathan Gregory – or was it Peter Francis? - walked past her and asked if she wanted something to eat, and then Mr. Taylor came and sat down next to her on the bleachers. "My son's playing well out there."

"He sure is."

"I suppose he's told you he turned down UT-Austin."

"Yep."

Mr. Taylor shook his head. "He's making an enormous mistake. He's not going to get to the NFL playing for a team like the Cougars. He wouldn't hear it from me. But perhaps…if you spoke to him."

Tami zipped up her jacket over her sweater. It was colder now that she wasn't standing and cheering. "He's already made a commitment."

"Well, he hasn't _signed_."

"Yeah, but he gave his word. I'm sure you've raised him to be a man of honor."

Mr. Taylor didn't have a comeback for that.

"He has to make his own decisions at this point in his life," she said.

"No one makes their own decisions. Everyone is influenced. My son, I believe, was influenced to choose UH by nothing more than its proximity to you."

"He had other reasons," Tami insisted. "He'll get more playtime."

"Maybe. But what does that matter if the team isn't nearly as good?"

"The Cougars won a bowl game in 1980," Tami said.

"They haven't won one since."

"Well, Eric might help change that," she suggested.

"Even academically, UH is less competitive than UT."

"UH is in the top ten in Texas academically," she insisted.

"And UT is number one."

"Those rankings change every year," she said.

"Do you know, if he gets injured at UH, he'll lose his scholarship completely?"

"He mentioned that. He said they'd give him until the end of the year. But he's not getting injured."

"Do you know what UT offered him?"

No. She didn't. Eric had intentionally avoided telling her that. "Eric's made up his mind, Mr. Taylor. I'm not going to be able to change it any more than you are."

Mr. Taylor rubbed his chin.

"James," Mrs. Taylor called from a couple of seats down. "Would you get me one of those soft pretzels and a coke?"

"Yes, my love," he said and stood. He looked down at Tami. "Eric's making a mistake. He could go all the way to the NFL. He really could. It's not a silly pipe dream of his. He could actually do it. But he's not going to do it on the Cougars."

A couple of minutes later, John Paul sat back down next to Tami. "Your ex-boyfriend sure likes that kindergarten game."

"What game?" Tami asked.

"Red light, green light."

Mo said "red light" as a way of announcing that he was on the edge of wanting to fight someone. Everyone in their old high school knew that, but there was no reason John Paul would. When Mo hollered, "green light," though, that meant he was going to throw his first punch. "You guys didn't fight did you? Did he try to hit you?"

"Oh, is _that_ what he was trying to do? I must have stepped down the bleachers right when he was swinging. I guess that's why he tripped."

"Any luck with the girl?" Tami asked.

John Paul pulled a slip of paper out of his pocket. A phone number was scrawled across the scrap.

"No wonder Eric doesn't trust you with me," she said.

"He trusts me completely. Why do you think I'm the one sitting next to you?"


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five**

Eric's team won the state championship, and there was much rejoicing in the stands. The entire extended family went out to celebrate that night. Tami stayed with the Taylors for much of Eric's winter break. He continued to sneak into Tami's bedroom for late night lovemaking and to sneak out again before his father rose early for daily mass.

Tami went to a candlelight service with the family on Christmas Eve, but she was confused about when to stand and kneel. People kept crossing themselves in the strangest way. She stayed seated when the entire family - including all the cousins - went up for communion, and she felt like everyone in the church was looking at her, even though they probably weren't.

On Christmas morning, with Mrs. Taylor's permission, she made a long-distance call to wish her mother and Shelley a Merry Christmas. "I can't believe you're spending all of winter break with Eric," Shelley said, "or that Mom is letting you!"

"There's no _letting_ anymore, Shell," Tami said. "I'm on my own." And she was, supported by her scholarship and her waitressing and no further contribution from her financially struggling mother.

"She's kind of upset you didn't come home for Christmas though."

"I was there for Thanksgiving. I'll be there for Easter."

"I'm kind of upset too," Shelley admitted. "I miss you, you know."

Tami was a little touched and resolved to write Shelley more letters.

The Taylors' tradition was to eat a late Christmas breakfast, which they trotted over to Uncle Andrew's house to attend. There was a lot of football watching after that, and also some throwing of a football in the living room, which Mr. Taylor remarked would not be tolerated in his own house. Presents were, to Tami's relief, not exchanged among the two families. It was not until they returned to the Taylor's house at eight in the evening that the nuclear family traded gifts.

Eric's parents gave him a rolled up piece of paper in a box inside a box. On the scroll was a note saying that the last three payments on his pick-up truck had been made for him as Christmas gift. Tami gave Eric the new Rolling Stones album, _Steel Wheels_ , on CD, since she knew his family had just gotten a CD player earlier this year.

To his parents, she'd given books that were on a list of approved titles Eric had drawn up for her. "Such a thoughtful gift," Mrs. Taylor said, turning the book over in her hands. "I've been really wanting to read this Amy Tan novel. I've heard it's so good."

Mr. Taylor removed the wrapping paper on his gift carefully, folded it neatly, and then looked at the book. "Hmm," he said. "John Grisham. Never heard of him."

Tami's eyes flitted to Eric. He'd put _A Time to Kill_ on the list of approved titles. "You'll like it, Dad," Eric said quickly. "It's a suspense thriller. Right up your alley. Tami picked good."

"She picked well," Mr. Taylor said.

"Thank you," Tami said, momentarily mistaking his grammar correction for a thank you.

Eric's gift to her was a gold chain, but there was nothing on it. She took it out of the box, a little puzzled, and looked at it against her hand. "It's lovely," she said. "I'm sure I can find something to use with it."

"It's for my state ring," Eric said. "When I finally get it."

Mr. Taylor raised an eyebrow as though he wasn't sure he approved of Eric offering Tami his state ring.

"I mean..." Eric muttered, "if you _want_ to wear it." He looked at her a little sheepishly. "If you're not embarrassed because it's...you know...a high school thing. And you're in college and all."

She knew Eric was a little self-conscious about their age difference. When he told guys he had a college-age girlfriend, they wink-winked and nodded knowingly and gave him an _atta-boy!_ smile. But the same thing didn't happen when Tami told her fellow college students that she had a boyfriend in high school. They looked at her like she was naive and just a little bit pathetic. _High school relationships never survive the first year of college_ , her roommate Jenny had told her once. _So I just broke up with my guy before I left. Otherwise, Tami, honey, you're just wasting time. You're going to miss out on the good ones, holding out for Eric._ Tami had told her Eric _was_ one of the good ones. _The best._

"I'll be so very proud to wear it," Tami assured him. "Thank you, sugar."

Eric colored a little. She'd forgotten that he didn't want her calling him sugar in front of his parents.

"Of course she wouldn't be embarrassed, Eric," his mother assured him. "There are grown men who still wear their high school state championship rings." She glanced at her husband.

"Don't look at me," Mr. Taylor said. "This is an AFL Championship ring." He toyed with the ring, turning it slowly around his finger.

"I know, darling. I was just thinking of when _you_ gave _me_ your high school state championship ring." She smiled.

Mr. Taylor, to Tami's surprise, smiled back, a little mischievously, and with a twinkle in his eye. Tami was used to seeing Mr. Taylor looking stern or at least serious. She had never seen this sort of expression on his face before. He looked like a different man.

"Well," he said, still holding his wife's eyes, and still smiling lightly, "I suppose now that we've traded gifts we should be getting to bed. It's been a long day, hasn't it?"

 **[FNL]**

After spending a full week with Eric, Tami missed him more than ever when she returned to MWU for her second semester. Her volleyball season was over, at least until spring training, so she didn't have that to distract her. Instead, she threw herself into studying and waitressing, and she tried not to be bothered that they could only afford a long-distance call twice a week. They took turns calling each other, but it was hard for either of them to spend 23 cents a minute when they both made less than $5 an hour.

So when the phone rang this evening, Tami leaped for it. It might be for her roommate, who was constantly getting calls from members of the neighboring UH baseball team, but she hoped it was Eric. She was a bit disappointed to hear Shelley on the other end of the line.

"Mom's going to be pissed you made a long-distance call, you know," Tami told her. Ms. Hayes called Tami once a week, for precisely five minutes. Anything more than that was not in the budget.

"She can deal. I need to talk to you. I have big news." Shelley said _big_ in a breathy, dramatic way, and Tami found herself praying – _please don't have done anything stupid._ Shelley had just turned 14 and thought she was ever so mature. She was completely boy crazy, and their mom worked too much to be able to supervise her adequately. Ms. Hayes preached to her daughters about chastity and purity, but she didn't know what either of them was really up to.

"What?" Tami asked cautiously.

"Mom finally filed for divorce."

"Really? Why?" Their parents had been separated for nine years. Tami hadn't seen her father in three, when he'd shown up drunk to wish her a happy sweet 16. He'd given her a dozen carnations and embarrassed her in front of her friends by falling over on the cake.

"I don't know," Shelley admitted. "Maybe she's given up on him ever - " Shelley mocked their mother's voice " - _getting right with the Lord_. Or maybe she wants child support for me, you know, for the next four years, and this is how she can finally make him contribute something. Or maybe she wants to date again."

"Mom? Date?"

"Crazy, I know," Shelley said. "But I got up for a glass of water at midnight the other night and she was talking on the phone. She was laughing, Tami, and saying, _Oh, don't! You don't mean it!_ like she _did_ want whoever was on the other end of that line to _mean_ it. And when she saw me, she said goodbye really fast."

"Who did she say she was talking to?"

"Someone from the Women's Bible Study."

"At midnight?" Tami asked.

"Suspicious, right? Anyway, just wanted to tell you she's done it, since I'm sure she's not going to tell you. She didn't tell me either. I just found the papers."

"How did you find them?"

"Looking through the desk drawers in her bedroom for clues about the mystery man on the phone."

"Shelley, you shouldn't rifle through Mom's drawers. And, who knows, maybe she really was talking to some woman from her Bible Study."

"Not the way she was laughing," Shelley insisted. "Not the way she hung up so fast."

"Well, tell me if you find out anything else." Shelley was right. Their mother certainly wasn't going to tell them. Ms. Hayes told her daughters how to live their lives. She didn't talk about her own life. Tami had always assumed that, other than work and church, she didn't _have_ one.

They talked a little longer, Tami about her classes and then Shelley about her secret boyfriend, a 15-year-old on the high school wrestling team that she sometimes met outside the DQ when biking home from school. Tami warned her to be careful. "He's too old for you. And boys are only after one thing, you know."

"The thing you're always giving Eric?" Shelley asked.

"Eric and I have a _real_ relationship, Shelley. I'm just saying…wait. Wait until you're at least 17 or 18."

"Did you?"

"Wait until you know the guy really well, until you love him, and you're sure he loves you."

"I'm not losing my virginity tomorrow, Tami! Geez. We've only kissed. You're so paranoid."

"I just want to make sure you know you don't have to rush into anything."

"I gotta go," Shelley said. "Mom's going to blow a gasket when she sees this bill."

 **[FNL]**

Eric officially signed with the Houston Cougars at the end of January. Tami didn't think too much about whether or not it was the right choice for him. She just wanted him nearby next year. Already, she was counting the days until spring break, when they could finally see one another again. It was only the second week of February, and mid-March seemed a lifetime away.

Valentine's Day was the worst. It fell on a Friday night, and she had to wait on tender couples who held hands across tables and stared fondly into one another's eyes. She was getting off at eight today, and she'd promised Eric Valentine's Day phone sex when she got back to her dorm room. Fortunately, Jenny had a date and would probably be spending the night with a guy at UH, so Tami would have the phone and the room to herself.

Eric had promised Tami a present too, which he'd said would arrive today, but it hadn't. The mail always came by two, but there had been nothing in her box when she left for work at four. She tried not to let it bother her. It was the mailman's fault, not Eric's, she assured herself for the fourth time that evening as she came to the bar to pick up some drinks. She had just put her tray down next to a some guy, without really looking at him, and was leaning over to signal the bartender when she felt a hand slide into the back pocket of her slacks. And then the jerk actually squeezed her ass. What kind of establishment did he think this was? Tami whirled and smacked him across the face.

"Ow!" he yelled, and put a hand to his cheek.

"Eric!" she gasped. "Oh God! Sorry! I didn't know it was you."

The bartender strode over to investigate the scene. "Everything all right here, Tami?"

"Yeah, John, this is my boyfriend, Eric. He just surprised me."

Eric nodded to the bartender.

"I need two martinis," Tami told John. "One apple and one normal." The bartender nodded, eyed Eric curiously, and then went back to mixing drinks. "What are you doing here?" Tami asked Eric, and then she squealed, jumped, and threw her arms around him. Tami kissed his cheek where she'd smacked him.

"What do you mean, what am I doing here? I'm your Valentine's Day present, of course."

She squealed again, hugged him, and kissed him properly on the lips this time. "You drove seven hours to see me? But what about school?"

"I skipped my last three periods and drove real fast. I'm a senior now. I deserve a skip day. I don't think I'll get in much trouble. I got Jimmy to cover my paper route tomorrow morning. I've got to leave by tomorrow evening, though, to drive back. My dad will be pissed if I miss Sunday morning mass."

"I understand." She clapped her hands together excitedly.

The bartender returned, tapped her tray, and said, "Busy night, Tami, you know."

"I know," she told him. "I'm getting right back to work."

The bartender shook his head and wandered away to the other end of the bar.

"I don't get off for another hour," Tami told Eric.

"I know. I'll sit here an drink root beer and wait for you. I made better time than I expected. I already got us a motel room."

"A motel room?" she asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Well, I know we can't stay in your dorm." MWU was very strict about the no opposite sex visitors after nine policy. Tami could get suspended for violating the rule.

"So you're expecting sex?" she asked. "Why?"

"Please tell me you're just joking."

She chuckled. He smiled.

"But can you afford that?" she asked. "All the gas money _and_ a motel room, with just your paper route money?"

"I shoveled a lot of snow in January. No one expected that blizzard." It rarely snowed in Texas, and, when it did, it usually melted by the next day, but they'd had five inches in January, and it hadn't melted. "And I'll start mowing lawns again in late March." He nodded at the bartender, who was eyeing them with a hint of irritation. "You better get back to work."

Tami had a really hard time concentrating on her work. She kissed Eric every time she came to pick up a drink from the bar.

One customer asked her, "Is a kiss included in the price of the special?" when she came back with his drink. He nodded across several tables to where Eric sat at the bar.

Tami did not find his comment amusing. Neither did the man's date. But Tami smiled anyway. She wanted a good tip, because she fully intended to treat Eric to breakfast in the morning.


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: _Smut WARNING for this chapter._**

 **Chapter 6**

By the time Tami and Eric got to the motel, they were hungry for each other. While he fumbled to get the key in the lock, she leaned with her back against the door and assaulted his ears and neck with nips and kisses and sensual suckles. Tami had his belt unbuckled and his jeans unbuttoned before they were even inside the room.

He kicked the door shut behind himself as she jerked his zipper down with a loud rasp. As she slid her hand into his pants, he moaned and yanked the top button of her slacks loose. Eric tugged at Tami's zipper as he backed her toward the desk. While he thrust the chair away from the desk and swept the motel pad and pen off its surface, she shimmied out of her slacks and panties. He lifted her onto the desk, where her bare bottom felt cool against the slick, wooden surface...

 **[*]**

"Damn I missed you," Eric breathed as he stood panting against her neck afterwards, his hands palm down on the desk on either side of her, as if his knees were too weak to support him now.

"I can tell." She giggled. "Can we at least take off our socks now?"

He laughed and stepped out of his pants and boxers, which were pooled around his feet. He peeled off his socks and then his T-shirt, and climbed naked under the sheets, where he sat and watched her pull her bra expertly out from the arms of her still-buttoned blouse. Her shirt tail fell to mid-thigh as she climbed in bed beside him.

"That shirt's got to come off too, you know," he said.

"I know. But I also know how much you like undoing buttons."

He smiled and slid down on his back, his head against the pillow and a wide grin on his face. She cuddled up, her head on his chest.

"I need some recovery time first," he said. "But then I'll get to them. One by one by one."

She kissed his bare chest and glanced at the clock, which read 8:32 PM. "We need to order a pizza. I'm starving. Did you eat?"

"Peanuts. At the bar." He reached over to the nightstand and handed her the receiver to the phone.

[*]

They sat cross-legged in bed with the open box of pizza between them. Tami just had the shirt on still, but Eric had pulled on his jeans to answer the door and pay for the pizza.

"Don't let that cheese slide off and burn any naughty bits," Eric told her. "I've got a use for those later."

"Yeah?" she asked with a smile. "Good, because I want the kisses."

" _The_ kisses, huh?" he asked.

" _The_ kisses," she agreed. "I'm glad you do that. Mo never wanted to."

"Let's not talk about your ex-sex-life with Mo, please."

"Sorry. Did you do it a lot for Sandy?"

"Let's not talk about my ex-sex life with Sandy either. But no. She didn't like it."

"What? What the hell is wrong with her? That's your best talent!"

"I'm glad you think so, but I mean she didn't even want to try it."

"Why?" Tami asked, completely befuddled.

"Don't know. Didn't ask. I offered, she said she didn't want to do that, and so...that was it."

"Weirdo," Tami said, and took a huge bite of pizza. After she'd swallowed, she asked, "Then how did you get so good at it?"

She knew Sandy was his first serious girlfriend. He'd dated her his entire sophomore year, when he lived in Euless. He'd never done more than kiss a girl before Sandy, and he'd lost his virginity to her. They broke up when he moved to North Dillon, both agreeing they should see other people rather than try to maintain a long distance relationship as mere juniors. At least, Eric had said it was mutual, but Tami suspected he might have broken Sandy's heart. It would have broken _her_ heart, after all.

He shrugged. "Natural born talent, I guess." He licked the sauce off one of his fingers. "But like any inborn talent – say, football – you've got to practice to perfect it. Preferably daily."

She laughed. "I could get behind that work-out plan." At least, she imagined she could, but that was easy to do when she was barely 19 and only got to see her boyfriend once every several weeks. Eric would remind her of this conversation several times throughout their long marriage.

They polished off the entire pizza between themselves, drank some water, and then Eric undid each of those buttons before they took a playful shower together. Later, he lay her naked across the bed and worked his way slowly down until he was between her legs...

"You liked that, didn't you?" he asked when he'd pulled himself back up and his lips were level with her ear.

"Yesss," she whimpered.

"I like doing that to you. It turns me on. See." He took her hand and placed it on his erection. "Did I make you feel good?"

"Uh-huh," she managed.

"Good. My turn." He did a sort of push up and then drew himself into a standing position before the bed. Still breathing hard, she sat up and slid forward. She began by kissing the taut muscles of his abdomen, with tantalizing nips and licks, but he gripped her long hair and tugged gently until she was looking up at him. His eyes were a little glazed. "No more teasing," he told her.

She smiled and began to give him what he wanted. "Good girl," he told her, and his breathing grew uneven. "Oh God, Tami, yes, you're a good, good, goood...oh...babe...that's so..." If she didn't know better, she'd have thought she was killing him based on the sounds that came out of him next.

[*]

"What time is it?" Tami asked. They were spooned naked together in bed now, but he was facing the clock.

"12:45," he said sleepily. They'd been talking for awhile now. It was a novelty, being able to talk in person, for _free_. And it felt right to be in Eric's arms, like she belonged there. Tami's sense of security had sometimes faltered these past few weeks, but she couldn't feel anything but certain here, in this bed, her back pressed against his chest, his flesh still warm and slick from their final round of lovemaking. She didn't want the time to escape from her. She didn't want to stop talking to him, but, soon enough, she fell asleep in mid word.

[*]

They went out for breakfast in the morning at the Waffle House next door to the motel, but she insisted on paying. "You got the motel and drove all the way down here. This is the least I can do. I didn't even give you your present. I was supposed to give you phone sex."

He looked around, leaned over the table confidentially, and whispered, "Not sure if you know this, but in person sex is better." She giggled and he leaned back against the booth. "But I fully expect phone sex next weekend. You promised I'd get it. And I'm holding you to that promise."

"Okay," Tami agreed, though the truth was she didn't really like to talk dirty on the phone. She always felt a little weird doing it, but she was willing to do it for Eric. It couldn't be easy for him, barely eighteen, horny, and surrounded by cheerleaders, a third of whom would probably be willing to go down on him under the bleachers if he would just ask. So every now and then, when she was sure Jenny wouldn't be walking in their room, she'd play the sultry girl on the other end of the line. Eric was lucky his parents let him have a phone in his bedroom. In the Hayes household, there had only been the one - in the kitchen.

Part of what made it awkward, maybe, was that Eric didn't say much when they had phone sex. He wanted _her_ to do most of the talking. He'd prompt her by asking things like - "What are you wearing?", "What are you doing to yourself now?", and "What do you want me to do to you?" She had to fill in the narrative between the questions. He just listened and…whatever else he was doing while he was listening. He didn't _tell_ her that. But she heard his breathing growing heavier and the "Ohhhh God" that came at the end of it all.

They went back to the motel after breakfast, because they had the room until noon check-out. They fooled around again and cuddled and talked afterward.

"My dad's pissed I didn't sign up for math this semester."

"Why?" Tami draped a leg over his hip. "You don't need it to graduate." She'd only taken through Algebra II in high school herself. "You didn't even need Trigonometry."

"I know." He let his hand slide down to the small of her back. "And I'm not going to use it when I double major in P.E. and history."

"Why does he care so much?"

"He still thinks I'm going to major in business when I go to college. He thinks I should manage a professional football team when I retire from the NFL. He doesn't get why I'm interested in history. It's just a bunch of dead people to him. But I don't want to be a manager. When I retire from the NFL, I'll just teach history or P.E. or something."

 _When he retired from the NFL._ Eric was playing well this season, and he had a college scholarship, but not very many guys got drafted to the NFL. She thought he was aiming a little high and setting himself up for almost certain disappointment, but she wasn't going to burst the bubble of his dream. "You'd make a great teacher," she said. "Or a coach. You should think about coaching when you retire from the NFL. You love to draw all those play diagrams."

He shrugged. "I don't know. Coaches have to yell a lot. I'm not a yeller." It was true she hadn't heard him yell often, but he had a commanding voice, and she was pretty sure that coach-hollering would become natural for him in time. "And they have to deal with dickish kids." He said it like he was already an adult and not a high school senior.

"So do teachers."

"Yeah, but only for fifty minutes at a time. Not for an entire football camp."

He rolled her over onto her back, smiled, and began assaulting her neck with agonizing kisses.

[*]

After a cheap lunch at Whattaburger, Tami took him to see her dorm room. When she opened the door and walked in, Jenny, who had been lying in bed and reading a Vogue magazine, sat up. "Hello," she said, and looked Eric over with a smile.

"Jenny, this is Eric," Tami told her. "My boyfriend."

Jenny stood and walked over and extended him her hand. "Okay, I get it now," she told Tami as Eric shook it. "I guess I'll skeedadle and give you guys the room." She winked at Eric, grabbed her purse, and left.

"She seems nice," Eric said, and then threw herself back down on Tami's bed. It creaked.

"She's okay," Tami said. "Mainly because she's not around much."

"Those are the best roommates."

"Like you'd know."

Eric made the bed squeak, wiggled his eyebrows, and patted the mattress.

"We did it like three times last night and twice this morning," Tami said.

"So? We aren't going to see each other again for four weeks. Besides, I think your roommate expects it. We shouldn't disappoint her."

"I'll be sore."

"Then you can just go down on me."

Tami sat down in her desk chair. "Romantic."

"Fine. What do you want to do? I don't have to leave until 8. Want me to take you to the movies or somehting?"

"You'd get home at three in the morning! Isn't mass at 8?"

"I can handle mass on four and a half hours of sleep."

She smiled. "I'll give you a tour of the campus. But first," she motioned him with one finger. "Come here."

He looked puzzled, stood, and walked over to where she sat. She began to unbuckle his belt.

"I thought you didn't want to."

"I changed my mind. Because you're such a good boy."

He grinned.

[*]

Tami went home to North Dillon for Spring Break, and Eric drove up from Odessa to spend it with her. Tami's mother, to her surprise, let him stay at their house. Tami slept in Shelley's room, and Eric took Tami's bed. Ms. Hayes did give him a not-so-subtle warning, however, that he was under _her_ roof. Tami snuck back to her own room anyway, but their lovemaking was quiet, Tami biting down on his shoulder, and Eric muffling his groans in the pillow. Shelley gave her a hard time about her midnight runs, but Tami knew her sister would never give her away.

"Any more news about Mom and the mystery man?" Tami asked one night as Shelley settled into bed. Tami was waiting to make sure her mother was asleep to sneak into Eric's bed.

"Yes. He exists. She met him four months ago when he came to inspect the oil rigs in North Dillon. He lives in Dallas."

Tami's eyes widened as she plopped down on Shelley's desk chair. "Are you saying Mom has a _boyfriend_?"

"Mom says they're just friends. They totally aren't dating, she claims. He's not interested in her that way, _supposedly_. But for someone who's not interested in her, he sure does call a lot."

Tami shook her head. "Have you met him?"

"Hell no, Tam. I had to drag it out of her that he even existed. Besides, he only comes to town about once a month."

"I just can't believe it. What's his name?"

"Antonio. He was born in Italy. He's some kind of oil company big shot. Probably makes good money."

"And he likes Mom?" Tami did not think of her mother as a sexual being. Ms. Hayes was always working, studying her Bible, and lecturing them about chastity.

"She's pretty, Tami. And he's ten years older than her."

"Why isn't he married?"

"He's widowed. His wife died three years ago. And that's all the information I got out of Mom."

Tami shook her head again. "And how's _your l_ ove life?"

"Mark said he'd break up with me if I didn't give him a blow job. So I broke up with him."

"Good for you!"

"Now I'm seeing a guy on the baseball team. Well...two of them, kind of."

"Oh, Good Lord."

[*]

Eric went to church with Tami for Easter. She leaned over and whispered to him, as communion was starting, "You can take it. We have open communion."

He shook his head. It looked weird to him. They were drinking it out of little plastic shot glasses. They weren't even kneeling at an altar to receive it. They were just walking up in a line and standing. The priest-pastor-whatever guy was also holding a loaf of bread instead of putting communion wafers on people's tongues. He was ripping off pieces of the loaf. Eric didn't want to mess it up and do it wrong. "I'll just sit here," he whispered back. He felt like Tami's mother was shooting him suspicious glances as she squeezed by him in the pew.

He had to leave after Easter brunch, to drive back in time for school on Monday. Tami's classes didn't restart until Tuesday. Before he left, they made out against his pick-up in the driveway of the Hayes house. "I'm really going to miss you," she said.

"Me too."

"You be good. I bet all the girls want you now that you're a State Champion."

"They still haven't given us our rings yet. I'll have it for you by summer though. And _you_ be good. I bet all those college guys want you because you're hot as hell."

She smiled and kissed him. "Two months is too long," she complained.

Eric was planning to visit her for the first weekend in summer. She'd be staying with her Mom then. Her scholarship didn't cover housing in the summer, so it made sense to come home. She'd also gotten a temporary receptionist job at the local car dealership, and she should probably be around for Shelley. Mom was working weird hours, and Shelley wasn't going to be getting the best supervision in the summer. Tami's sister did have a cheerleading camp for two weeks, but otherwise she'd be home without much to do but get in trouble.

Eric was going to mow lawns in Odessa and help coach a kids' flag football camp there to save as much money as possible. Then he'd be headed to UH in early August for spring training. Summer was going to be mostly long-distance too.

"I'll try to drive to MWU the last weekend in April," he promised her. "If I can save up for the gas and a motel."

"I'll get the motel," she told him. "I'm making good tips now."

He chuckled. "I bet."

"Yeah, I figured out if I wore a short black skirt instead of the slacks and I unbuttoned my top two buttons, my tips go up."

He frowned.

"I'm kidding," she said. "Part of why I wanted to work there was the uniforms." They were conservative. She still found that didn't stop men from constantly staring and her breasts and butt, though. She hadn't minded that in high school. She'd felt a little flattered, but those were high school guys. These were thirty, forty year old men. It creeped her out a little.

"If one of those customers ever gets fresh with you - "

"- I know. You'll kick his ass." She kissed his nose. "You better go."

He nodded, but he made out with her for another ten minutes before he actually left, with a painful hard-on straining against the zipper of his jeans.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

 **[August]**

Eric and Tami saw each other only three times over the long summer. There were too many miles between them, and they were both working so hard to save up spending money. Tonight, he lay with her in the guest bedroom in Odessa, where he'd snuck after his parents were asleep. She had to leave tomorrow afternoon to get back to North Dillon in time for work. He was leaving next weekend for summer training at UH, and they wouldn't see each other until she returned to MWU the day before classes started.

"I can't wait until we're only twenty miles apart," she said. They would both be living on campus at their respective universities, courtesy of their individual scholarships. Tami would have the same roommate as last year, though Eric had not yet met his.

He rolled her on her side so they could spoon together, and he kissed her bare shoulder. "Me either."

"You're going to be really popular, you know, in college. Mr. Star Quarterback." She said it like a joke, but the truth was, she was a little nervous. She knew that the power structure of their relationship was about to shift. She'd been the older, popular girl in high school - prom queen, homecoming queen, star of the volleyball team - the girl all the boys chased, the fish some couldn't believe Eric had caught. But as a freshman in college, she had been a mediocre volleyball player and a bookworm, struggling to handle the challenging course material after having blown off studying in high school.

"You know I'm not going to be QB1, right? That I'll be second string?"

"At first," she said. "But they'll move you up your sophomore year."

"Probably," he agreed, with a bit more self-assurance than he usually exhibited. "That's one of the reasons I wanted UH instead of UT. It would have taken me until my junior year to become QB1 at UT." He sighed, his breath warm against her shoulder. "I wish my dad got that, but he's all about the prestige of the Longhorns. And that was his old team. He thinks I can't get noticed at UH, but guys get noticed all the time, even from smaller schools."

She rolled over and kissed him. "So you weren't doing it just to be near me?" She'd been feeling a little guilty about that, ever since Mr. Taylor's conversation with her at the state championships.

"I can't say that wasn't a huge, huge plus in the UH column." He smiled and kissed her back. He cupped one of her breasts and began to run a thumb in small circles around her nipple, and she forgot what they were talking about.

[-]

"When do you have to be back to MWU for volleyball training?" Mrs. Taylor asked Tami over breakfast the next morning.

"I uh...I actually quit the team."

Mr. Taylor peered at her over the top of his newspaper.

"Oh," Mrs. Taylor said, a note of surprise in her voice. "And why did you do that?"

"I was good at the high school level, but I don't get much play time in college. And practice and training takes up so much of my time. I really need more time to work and to study."

Eric set a coffee cup in front of her - he'd just refilled hers, and settled into his chair. "I tried to talk her out of it, Mom, but I guess I'm not very persuasive."

Mr. Taylor folded his paper and set it on the table. "It's not as if it's football," he said. "College women's volleyball is hardly a career-building sport. Her time would be better served working and studying."

Tami looked at him over her coffee cup. Somehow, Eric's father had just manged to insult her and support her in the same statement. She'd seen him do that with Eric as well, who was now bristling because of his father's words, though he didn't say anything.

Mr. Taylor rose. "I'm headed to morning mass."

Mrs. Taylor stood also. "I think I'll join you this morning, dear. I can be a little later to work today. We aren't having a nurse's meeting this morning." Mrs. Taylor had finished her refresher classes and begun work in July.

Mr. Taylor held the door open for her and then followed her out.

"Sorry my dad's such a jerk," Eric said.

"Well, compared to my own dad, he's really not that bad."

"You heard from him since your mom officially divorced him?"

She shook her head. "He could be dead and I wouldn't know."

He reached out and took her hand on the table. "Sorry, babe. I know it can't be easy."

She shrugged. "I got over it years ago. I'm just glad my mom finally singed the papers."

Eric looked at her like he didn't believe her. He leaned across the table and kissed her. "I love you," he whispered.

 **[October]**

Tami moaned. Eric's State Championship ring dangled just above her bare breasts from the gold chain he'd given her last Christmas. The springs of the dorm bed creaked and groaned.

"Please...please..." she cried.

"Please what?" breathed Eric, nipping her earlobe. "Tell me, Tami."

"Please!"

The headboard struck the wall. "You like that?"

She was groaning now.

He moved faster, his breath thickening in her ear. "Tell me you like it."

"Yes! Eric...yes! God yes!" She arched her back, clawing a light trail between his shoulder blades as she came.

"Good girl," he whispered, and thrust twice more before moaning out his own release. When he rolled off of her, still half panting, she rolled to her side so they could both fit on his tiny dorm room bed.

She snuggled into him. "That was good," she said. "But I feel bad that your roommate always has to find someplace else to crash on Sundays."

They chose Sunday for their regular sleepover night because Eric sometimes had away games on Saturday and wasn't back in Houston until Sunday, and her first Monday class wasn't until noon.

"Well, he does the same thing to me once a week."

"Really?" She raised herself up on her elbow. "Wait. Where do you _stay_?"

"At Grady's apartment." His old friend Grady was a college sophomore and wasn't required to live in the campus dorms anymore. They'd played football together at a junior high in Odessa, while Eric was in 7th grade and Grady was in 8th, and they'd remained friends even after Eric moved to Euless for 9th grade, Weslaco for 10th, and then again to North Dillon for 11th. By the time he was back in Odessa for 12th grade, though, Grady was in college. Still, they had hung out together over the years, whenever Eric visited his aunt and uncle and cousins in Odessa, and sometimes they had even squared off against each other in games. Over this past summer in Odessa, they'd formed their own lawn care business together and had worked forty hours a week trimming and mowing and edging.

She raised an eyebrow. "Are there any girls there?"

"Just Grady's. They're living together now. One bedroom. But they let me crash on the couch."

She tugged on the sheet to let him know she wanted to get under. They slithered beneath it and spooned together, front to back, with Eric's back pressed against the dorm room wall.

"So…Grady and his girlfriend are living together, huh?" she asked. "When did that happen?"

"She moved in two weeks ago."

"Maybe we should move in together next summer. Some place between MWU and UH. Ten miles each way. We can commute to class."

"Your scholarship only covers on-campus housing," he said.

"Yeah," she said, "but yours will give you a cash stipend if you want to live off-campus, right?"

"Yeah….I don't know. Houston traffic is bad. I have to get to practice a lot…I work at the bookstore…it'd just be easier for me to live on campus."

"We could live _near_ UH and _I_ could commute the whole twenty miles," she said.

"Yeah…I think it would just be more convenient if we stayed in our dorms."

She was glad she had her back to him. She didn't want him to see the disappointment on her face. But she couldn't help saying, "I guess that's too big a commitment for you."

"Tami, you know I love you."

She slid out of bed and started getting dressed. "Then what's the problem with living together?" she asked as she finished putting on her underwear. "Don't give me that convenience crap." She yanked up her pants. "We're constantly driving back and forth from MWU and UH." She pulled her shirt over her head. "It would all be a lot more convenient to live together."

"Why are you getting dressed?"

"I don't know. Because I'm irritated? Because I don't understand why you don't want to live with me? This isn't exactly a fling." She thought they were headed for marriage, that he would probably propose his senior year – if not her senior year.

"Of course it's not." He sat up. "I love you. Babe, you know how much I love you."

She sat on his desk chair. "Then what's the problem with living together?"

He ran a hand through his hair. "I just…I don't want to…you know….live in sin."

She laughed. "You've got to be kidding." She hooked his boxers off the floor with her foot, lifted them to her hand, and threw them in his face. "You have _got_ to be kidding."

He pulled them on. He took her hand. "I'm not. It's an appearances thing, I guess. I don't want to tell my mother and father I'm living with you."

"They _have_ to know we're having sex."

"Yeah, but it's a completely different thing, Tami. Living together. It's like _announcing_ it to the _world_. They'd flip. So would your mom. Why should we do that to them?"

"Why should we care what they think?" She pulled her hand out of his.

"I do care, Tami. Your mom _actually_ likes me right now. If we moved in together…" He shook his head.

"Fine," she said. She stood up. "I'm hungry. Get dressed and take me out for something."

"A'ight." He pulled his pants and shirt on while she got her shoes.

As she stood waiting for him at the door, she wondered if he really cared about their parents, or if he just liked his freedom, if he saw living together as too big of a relationship leap, if maybe he still wanted to keep his options open. She knew he wasn't cheating – Eric would never do that – he had too much integrity - but he might break up with her. Maybe this relationship didn't feel like a done deal for him, the way it felt for her.

He'd been head-over-heels for her in high school, but now he was playing college ball, and he was surrounded by beautiful, smart, confident college girls from all over the state – all over the country, even. Maybe now that he was out of high school and out of west Texas, he was beginning to realize that Tami wasn't the be all and end all – that he had good options… and plenty of them.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight**

Eric took Tami out for ice cream, but the walk there was silent and awkward because she was still upset about his disinterest in living together. While they were sitting and eating their sundaes, at least three girls stopped by the table to say hello to him. One particularly busty one smiled and said, "Are we still on for study group Tuesday?" _Still on._ Like it was a date.

"Yeah," Eric said. "Jen, this is my girlfriend Tami."

The girl smiled at Tami, but it was a flinching smile. Apparently Eric hadn't mentioned a girlfriend and she was disappointed to discover he had one. "Hey, nice to meet you," Jen said. "Are you a freshman?"

"Sophomore. I go to MWU."

"Oh…is that weird? All girls? I bet that would be soooo hard. Oh, but…you have a boyfriend already." She winced apologetically at Eric. "You don't have the Greek system at all, though, do you? I would hate that. I'm Delta Delta Delta!"

"We have sororities." Tami hoped her voice didn't sound as irritated coming out of her mouth as it sounded in her head.

"Oh. Well, what sorority are you in?"

"I'm not in one."

"Oh…" The girl tilted her head sympathetically. "You didn't make the cut?"

"No," Tami said thinly, "I didn't pledge." The truth was, she'd yet to find the time, between school, work, and Eric. But that's not what she said. Instead, she leveled her eyes at the Tri-Delta and answered, "I prefer not to buy my friends."

"Wow." Jen's mouth fell open. "Nice girlfriend you have there, Eric." She turned and walked away.

Eric scratched his head. "That was kind of rude."

"I know." Tami stirred her spoon in the melted ice cream at the bottom of her cup. "She was, wasn't she?"

"I meant you."

Tami looked up into Eric's irritated eyes. She wavered between anger and remorse. But then he smiled slightly. "You're jealous aren't you?" he asked. "You're feeling a little possessive of me, aren't you?"

"I am _not_ jealous," Tami insisted. "Jealous isn't sexy."

"Oh, well, then you can't possibly be jealous. Because you are _definitely_ sexy."

Tami laughed.

He smiled. "She's just in my math study group," Eric assured her. "I have to have six math or science credits. Once I knock the core requirements out of the way, it's just history and P.E. for the rest of college."

Just then yet another girl stopped by to say hello to Eric, a long-haired Hispanic beauty who looked to be older than Tami, and this one actually patted his head. _Touched_ him. _The nerve._

"Tami," he said, "this is Angie. This is Grady's girlfriend."

Relieved, Tami smiled. "Hey, I've heard about you from Eric. It's so nice to meet you."

"You too," Angie agreed. "Eric talks about you _constantly_. It's nice to finally put a name to the face."

"You want to join us?" Tami pushed out a chair.

"Nah. Thanks, but I have to get home. Grady's making me a late dinner. Can you believe that? Does Eric ever cook for you?"

"He did once in Odessa. He made me his award-winning chili." Tami smiled at Eric teasingly. "I had to add a little tobasco sauce."

Angie snorted.

"Not true," Eric said. "She loved it. And it hasn't won any awards yet, but I fully intend to enter it in the next cook-off."

Tami watched Angie as she went out the door. When the door had closed, she swirled her head back to Eric. "She's _gorgeous_!"

"I know," Eric said.

"How did Grady…I mean, I like Grady, he's a great guy and all, but girls who look like that don't usually…." Grady was a very big, African-American guy, and the bigness wasn't all muscle either. Grady's bulk had served him in his defensive position, but his teammates called him _Fat Albert_ , after the cartoon character. He was a decent player, but not an exceptional one, and although he'd made it onto the team at UH, he hadn't received a scholarship, and he often warmed the bench.

Eric shrugged. "He rescued her. Chicks dig that whole knight in shining armor thing."

"Rescued her? From what?"

"She was at this frat party, and she was pretty drunk, and this guy was pulling her off toward a bedroom. Grady could tell she didn't really want to go with him. The guy just pulls her into the room and shuts the door, even though she's saying no. So Grady busts down the door and," Eric raised his hand in a punching motion and brought his fist down to the table. "Bam. Kicks his ass. Then he helps Angie home and holds her hair while she vomits. Romantic, huh?"

Tami was feeling a little better about their relationship by the time they began walking back toward the dorms, but meeting Angie had also reminded her that Eric didn't want to live with her. Grady and Angie had only been together a few months. Counting high school, she and Eric would have been together two years by this February.

As they were walking along a path through a wooded area, he grabbed her hand and pulled her over to a tree. It was dark, and the moonlight filtered through the remaining leaves. Most were scattered on the ground all around them. He leaned back against the tree trunk and put a hand on each of her hips. "Look at me," he said.

She did. His eyes were dark pools in the starlight.

"I love you," he said. "Why don't we just get married at the end of the school year? Then we can move in together this summer and no one will say anything about it."

"What?" Tami asked. Was this some kind of a proposal?

"Let's get married," he repeated. "We can move into an off campus apartment this summer. Use my housing allowance."

Apparently it _was_ a proposal.

"I…Eric…"

"Please?"

She snorted, partly from surprise, and partly because of the oddness of his proposal.

"Pretty please?" he asked, smiling. "With a cherry on top? I'd even let you pick the bedspread."

Now she was really laughing.

"Come on," he moved his hands from her hips to her back and tugged her against himself. "Marry me. Just do it."

"I don't know," she said as her laughter trailed off. "It's such a romantic proposal. Give me a moment to recover from your disarming eloquence so I can think about it."

"Sorry," he said. "I'll get you an engagement ring later. I didn't know…you know…I wasn't planning to propose tonight."

"Clearly."

"But then you brought up living together, and I thought…" He shrugged. "I'd like to, just not like _that_."

"So you were serious about that whole not living in sin thing?"

"I'd rather marry you. Is that so awful?" he asked.

"No."

"No?"

"I mean…no, it's not so awful. And yes, I'll marry you."

He laughed and twirled her away from the tree as leaves broke free from the branches and drifted down over them like a blessing.

 **[*]**

"Thanks a lot, man," Eric's best friend Grady told him Monday afternoon as he spotted him in their weight lifting class. The class was a requirement if Eric wanted to minor in phys ed, but Grady had taken it as a gut. He was strong, if portly. "Now Angie is going to expect a proposal."

Eric shrugged as he sat up on the bench and wiped the sweat from his brow with a towel. "Then give her one. You're not going to do better than Angie. She's your Tami."


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

 **[November]**

Tami and Eric went to the Taylors' house in Odessa for Thanksgiving. They had decided not to tell their respective parents about the engagement quite yet. Tami still didn't have a ring. "I'm working on it," Eric had promised her. "I just need to save a bit more."

"I don't need anything fancy, sugar."

"She doesn't understand," Eric told his cousin John Paul when they were sent to grab some extra bottles of wine from his Uncle Andrew's house. They'd almost run out, and Thanksgiving dinner hadn't even been served. Everyone except Eric's youngest three cousins were drinking. Mr. Taylor had frowned on the teenagers imbibing, now that the legal drinking age had been raised to 21, but Eric's uncle had assured him that it was still perfectly legal for them to drink in the presence of their own parents.

"Even just to get her something simple," Eric said as they walked into the house, "is going to wipe out my entire savings."

"Well," said John Paul as he opened the cupboard in his mother's kitchen and pulled out some bottles, "what are you saving for, exactly, if not something like this?"

"It's fine, I just…I want to get her something decent, you know?"

"You want to borrow some money from me?"

Eric laughed. Mr. Taylor was paying some of John Paul's tuition with Eric's college fund, and John Paul was considering a future career in stage acting. He wasn't precisely rolling in it, and he wasn't ever likely to be. "Nah. I'll just tutor a bit more. I'll have it before Christmas. We're not telling anyone else yet, you know. So don't go blabbing to anyone."

"I'm as silent as the grave."

"You'll be one of my groomsmen, right?" Grady would be his best man.

"Of course. I can also do a scripture reading for you if you like. Something sexy." He handed Eric two bottles and took another two out.

"A sexy scripture reading?" Eric asked as he headed toward the door.

"Sure. Something from Song of Songs. _Your breasts are like two fawns, like twin fawns of gazelle that browse among the lilies._ Doesn't that make you think of Tami?"

"Watch it!"

John Paul laughed as he followed Eric out the door. " _I will climb the palm tree,"_ he said in his Richard Burton-esque voice, " _I will take hold of its fruit. Her breasts are like clusters of grapes on the vine -_ "

"- You're just lucky we grew up together."

"Nah, cuz, you're the lucky one, to have enjoyed my scintillating company for so long."

They put the wine bottles in the trunk of John Paul's twelve-year-old Vega. "Shit," he said. "Philip Andrew wanted me to grab a book while I was here. Can you run into my dad's library and get it? _Seven Storey Mountain_. It's got a monk on the cover."

Eric shook his head. "He's going to read while we watch football, isn't he?"

 **[December]**

Football season had drawn to a close for the Houston Cougars the last week of November. There would be no bowl game this year, but Eric had played well, and he expected to be QB1 his sophomore year.

Grady and Angie eloped suddenly the second weekend in December. They got married in a Houston courthouse, with only Eric and Tami as their witnesses.

"We're not doing that," Tami said as they followed the newly married couple out of the courthouse. There was a light feathering of snow on the steps, a rare Texas dusting. "I want a _real_ wedding."

"He just wanted to beat me to it," Eric said.

"Not everything is a competition, Eric."

He put his arm around her waist. "Well, if it were, I'd be the hands-down winner."

She laughed and kissed him.

He stopped walking. "Hey, is there someone I should officially ask for your hand in marriage?"

Even if Tami knew where her father was, she wouldn't want Eric asking him. "I guess you could ask my mother when we go home for winter break." They were spending the Christmas holiday at Tami's house, and then going to Odessa to his parents' house for New Year's Eve. It was as if the in-law juggle had already begun. "Maybe I'll have a ring by then." She smiled and toyed with the state ring she wore around her neck. "I mean, besides this one."

"Subtle," he said. "Very subtle." He took her gloved hand in his own, waved goodbye to Grady and Angie, and tugged her down the street in the opposite direction. "Let's walk in the park," he said. "It's pretty, with the snow."

There were some kids in the park, trying to sled on the mere two inches down a would-be hill. Eric came to a stop in the snow-dusted grass and dropped to one knee. Tami smiled and covered her mouth with her hands. He'd caught her off guard - again.

He reached into the pocket of his black leather jacket and pulled out a small box and opened it to reveal a solitaire. A light snow began to fall again, almost as if he'd planned it, large, airy flakes dusting his hair, which was a shade darker now than it had been when they'd started dating. "Tami," he said. "I love you. I'm not good at speeches, so, I'm just gonna ask…Will you do me the great honor of agreeing to be my wife?"

She nodded and pulled off her glove and held out her hand to him so he could slide the ring on her finger. "It's so beautiful," she said.

"I'll get you a bigger one for our tenth anniversary."

"I won't want a bigger one."

He stood up and kissed her.

"Hey, mister," came a child's voice from behind him.

Eric broke the kiss, turned, and smiled. "No one's ever called me mister before."

"My cat's stuck up in that tree." The boy pointed a little way across the park. "Can you help?"

Eric ran a hand through his hair and brushed out the light snow flakes. "Who brings a cat to a park in winter? You should have a dog, kid."

"Please?"

"Sure."

 **[*]**

There was no justice in it. Eric had made it through a half dozen hard tackles this past season without so much as a sprained ankle. It was like the guy who comes home safely after months at war only to die in a car accident a mile from his own house.

Tami told him the upper branches looked too weak, but Eric had just put a ring on her finger. He was invincible.

She heard the branch snap first, then the thud, crash, rustle, thud, and, at last, the second snap, three times as loud as the first. Not a branch this time.

 **[*]**

When they finally let Tami into his hospital room, his leg was already in a cast. He was just staring at the ceiling. A curtain was drawn between him and his roommate, who was snoring loudly.

"Hey," she said softly and kissed him. She drew the chair up and sat down and took his hand and squeezed. He looked furious. "How bad is it?"

"Bad," he said, "Obviously." He nodded angrily to his leg.

"Hey," she said. "I'm here." Shouldn't that count for something? Take at least a little of the anger out him?

"Doctors said there's a bone chip…or something…I can't play on it next season."

"But you can play your junior year," Tami assured him.

"It doesn't work like that. I'll be replaced. I'm losing my scholarship, and I won't get it back, even if I make the team as a walk-on my junior year, which I may not. Even if I do, I'll never play quite as well again." He slid his hand free from hers and rested it on his chest. "So much for the NFL."

She nervously twisted her engagement ring. The diamond caught the overhead hospital light and sparkled, but Eric couldn't see that. He'd turned his face to the curtain.

"Maybe we shouldn't get married," he said.

"What? Why? Why would you say that?"

"I'm not going to be able to support you now."

They'd had it all planned out. They were going to get an apartment on the housing allowance from his scholarship. He wasn't going to have to pay a dime in tuition, books, or fees. The money they made working part-time would cover the rest of their expenses.

"Support _me_?" she said. "No, Eric Taylor. That's not how this works. We support _each other_. That's how this works. And we're _going_ to make this work." She stroked his cheek.

He pressed her palm against his cheek and turned his face to kiss her hand.

"I love you," she said, "I love you, and we're going to figure something out."


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten**

 **[Christmas Eve]**

Eric pushed the passenger's seat back as far as it would go. His crutches lay in the back seat of Tami's sedan, and his cast was stretched out before him, a scrawl of black and blue and red signatures.

Tami had temporarily taken off her engagement ring so Eric could approach her mother to ask her blessing.

When they arrived, Eric hobbled with the Hayes family to an afternoon Christmas Eve service at the Methodist church Tami's family attended. They had ham for dinner after church. The TV was two rooms away from the kitchen. Eric excused himself twice to go to the bathroom, just so he could check the score. After dinner, Tami tugged Shelley off to the living room, and he lingered in the kitchen where Ms. Hayes was washing dishes.

"Can I help?" he asked.

"Lord, no, Eric," she said. "You're on crutches. Go watch your game. Kick Shelley off the TV if you have to."

He took a deep breath. "Ma'am," he said, standing on one leg, leaning half forward on his crutches, "I love your daughter."

"I figured that out."

"And…uh…I want to marry her. And I'd like your blessing, ma'am."

She switched off the water, dried her hands, and turned to look at him. "Did you get my daughter pregnant?"

"No, ma'am! We…we don't plan to have kids until we both have our degrees and we've worked a few years."

Ms. Hayes leaned back against the sink and crossed her arms over her chest. "How old are you, Eric?"

"Nineteen, ma'am. I'll be twenty in spring. My dad held me back from kindergarten." Mr. Taylor had thought his size and age would give him an advantage in football.

"And how exactly do you plan to provide for my daughter, at the age of nineteen, with a part-time job at the bookstore? Because she's not going to end up like me, working two or three jobs, supporting her husband, only to have him…" She shook her head.

"Well…I also tutor. After I finish my freshman year, I'm going to take a one year leave of absence from college." That would also give him time to recover from his injury, so he'd still be able to play for three years when he returned to college, assuming he could make the team. "That year, I'll work full-time at the bookstore, do some tutoring on top of that, yard work, whatever I can do to make money. We're going to split a two-bedroom apartment with our friends Angie and Grady."

"Tami's scholarship only covers housing if she stays in the MWU dorms."

"I know, ma'am. But we'll get an affordable apartment, and we'll be sharing the rent. If we live cheaply, I should be able to pay all of our bills and maybe save up some money for tuition when I go back to school."

"Won't your father help you with tuition?"

"I don't know," he admitted. He hadn't asked. He knew his father had saved for his college education, but when Eric got the scholarship, Mr. Taylor had given some of that money to John Paul. He'd also been upset that Eric took the UH scholarship instead of the UT one, and he probably wasn't going to be pleased with his plan to marry while still in school. He wasn't counting on any financial help from his father. "If he does, that'll just be a boon."

Mrs. Hayes slapped a dish towel down on the counter. "But Tami _is_ staying in school?"

"Yes ma'am. She's going to quit her waitressing job and load up on classes for the next three semesters, go to summer school too, so she can graduate early. Then she'll work full-time, probably as a guidance counselor, while I finish my degree."

"You'll have three years left on your degree."

"Yes, ma'am."

"It sounds to me like your plan is to have _her_ support _you_. Put _you_ through college."

Eric's leg was itching like mad beneath the cast. He shifted his weight. "Well, _after_ I put her through, ma'am. She'll get her degree _first_."

"I like you, Eric. I do. But I've had too many friends who have gotten their putting-hubby-through degrees only to get traded in on a newer model."

"I'm not buying a car, ma'am. I'm marrying the girl I love. My best friend. The woman I want to spend the rest of my life with."

Ms. Hayes smiled slightly. She uncrossed her arms. "What do your parents have to say about this?"

"I came to you first."

"Before Tami?"

"Well…no…not before Tami."

Ms. Hayes reached behind herself and opened the dishwasher while still looking at Eric. "She said yes?"

Eric nodded.

"Then there's not much I can do. She's got a strong will, that one, once she decides she wants something. And I guess she wants you." She began loading the dishwasher.

"Then…then we have your blessing?"

"I don't know what my blessing's worth, Eric." She put some silverware in the baskets. "I failed at my own marriage." She turned around. "But you have my hope."

 **[*]**

Two days after Christmas, Eric and Tami drove on to Odessa. Betty Taylor noticed the engagement ring the moment Tami stepped through the door of the Taylor's house in Odessa. Mrs. Taylor squealed and hugged her. "Look, James, do you see? They're engaged!"

Mr. Taylor looked at the ring, looked at his son's cast, and then looked back at the ring. "Interesting timing," he said.

"Oh, James! Congratulate them."

He didn't.

Over dinner in the Taylor's formal dining room, Eric told his parents that they had decided on a late May wedding.

"Why don't you wait until you finish college?" Mr. Taylor asked.

"You and Mom didn't wait," Eric said.

"It was a different time," Mr. Taylor insisted.

"We want to live together to save money," Tami told him. "You wouldn't want us to do that if we weren't married, would you?" She'd have him there, she thought.

Mr. Taylor glanced at her. "You can wait to live together until you have your college degrees."

Eric put his fork down on his plate. "You and Mom didn't."

"We were _married_ ," Mr. Taylor said.

"Exactly my point," Eric replied.

"Two can live more cheaply than one, James," Mrs. Taylor insisted.

"You know, I've already promised a good portion of your college fund to John Paul," Mr. Taylor told Eric. "I was relying on you to be sensible and maintain your scholarship. I'm not going to backpedal on my promise."

"Yes, sir. I understand," Eric said.

"I can give you a total of $8,000 for tuition," Mr. Taylor told him, "but what's UH? $4,000 a year in tuition and fees? That still leaves you two years to cover. I don't think this is the time to be getting married."

"They love each other, James," Mrs. Taylor said. "They might as well. And we'll be happy to pay for the wedding."

"We will?" Mr. Taylor asked.

"Of course we will," Eric's mom insisted. "Tami's mother can't possibly afford to."

"Shouldn't they pay for their _own_ wedding?" Mr. Taylor asked. "Like we did?"

Betty Taylor put a hand on her husband's back. "You know how hard it is starting out, James. They'll have bills…and Eric's tuition!"

"Well, Eric wouldn't have _any_ tuition if he'd taken my advice and signed with the Longhorns. They'd have let him keep his scholarship _even_ if he got injured. And maybe he _wouldn't_ have gotten injured. Maybe they don't have quite so many _kittens_ in Austin." Eric bit his bottom lip. "Maybe he'd be on his way to the NFL." Mr. Taylor looked steadily across the table at Eric. "How do you intend to provide for her?"

Eric met his father's eyes and told him their plan.

"Hmmmm…It's not a _bad_ plan, actually," Mr. Taylor mused. "It's fiscally conservative, prioritizes your educations...but, son, why don't you try to finish early like Tami? You already have those eight AP credits from history."

"Because I still want to work some in the spring and summer. And I'm going to try out for the team. So I'll be busy in the fall."

"You're going to try to walk-on?"

"Yes, sir."

"You realize," Mr. Taylor said, "that after an injury like that, your chances of making it to the NFL are almost nill?"

"I…I just want play, Dad. I just…love to play. I told you I'm going to be a teacher."

"Not the most lucrative career."

"It's stable, James," Betty Taylor said. "There are benefits. And it's meaningful."

"You're getting married in our church, I suppose?" Mr. Taylor asked. "You'll have to get special permission from the bishop to enter a mixed marriage."

" _Mixed_ marriage?" Tami asked.

"That's….uh…that's just what it's called," Eric stuttered. "When a Catholic marries a non-Catholic."

The term seemed a little insulting to Tami.

"And of course Tami will have to commit to raising the children Catholic," Mr. Taylor said as though he honestly expected no dispute from anyone.

 **[*]**

"I'm not getting married in the Catholic church," Tami told Eric when his father went to make a phone call in his home office and Mrs. Taylor retreated from the dining room to the kitchen to prepare dessert.

"It's not a big deal, Tami, the permission thing. It's easy to get."

"I can't promise to raise the kids Catholic! I don't even know what I want to be. If I want to go to church at all."

She hadn't been to church on her own since she'd gone away to college, except for the required chapel at MWU; even then she had a friend sign her in half the time. She knew Eric wasn't going to church much either, unless he was home in Odessa or his parents were visiting in Houston or he had big game coming up.

"Oh," he said.

"Do you _want_ to raise the kids Catholic?"

"Um…no?"

"Is that a question?"

"No…whatever you want, Tami. I just want to marry you and live with you and go to bed with you every night."

"So…can we get married in my mom's church, then? In Nort Dillon? They won't make us get _permission_. They won't make us _promise_ to raise the kids _Methodist_."

"A'ight," he said. "Whatever you want."

When Eric's parents rejoined them, peach cobbler and ice cream on the placemats before them all, Tami said, "We've decided to get married in my family's church, in North Dillon. It's Methodist."

Mr. Taylor let out a long, put-upon sigh and Mrs. Taylor said, "I'd really hoped you'd get married in the church where you grew up, Eric. It's a _very_ beautiful ceremony, Tami. You'd love it if you saw it."

"I appreciate that, Mrs. Taylor, I do, but we've decided this is what's best for us. It's not an easy commitment for me to make, to promise to raise the children in a particular denomination."

Mr. Taylor looked at Eric. "I can't say I'm not disappointed by your decision to reject the tradition I spent years trying to raise you up in."

"I'm not _rejecting_ it, Dad."

"That's not what's happening here," Tami insisted. "He's not becoming Methodist. We're just getting married in the church where _I_ grew up, which is _as_ important to _my_ mother as I'm sure it is to you two. I'm doing it out of respect for my mother." That should soften him up a little, Tami thought.

"I appreciate that you respect your mother," Mr. Taylor said. "But what about the children?"

"We'll figure something out," Tami told him. "We're not having kids tomorrow."

Mr. Taylor laced his fingers together and rested his chin on his hands. "It's not the kind of thing you should talk about _after_ the fact."

"We'll talk about it beforehand," Tami assured him. "We will. We don't have to decide _today_."

Mr. Taylor pushed back his chair and disappeared out of the dining room.

He returned a moment later, with a checkbook and a pen in his hands. He set the book on the kitchen table and began scrawling violently. He wrote: "Tami Hayes" in the TO line, "$6,000.00" in the money line, and then signed the bottom. He ripped it out and handed it to her.

"That's a check," he said, "for the wedding. I figured I should give it to you, since you're clearly making all the decisions."


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter Eleven**

Eric's parents' room was directly above Tami's. She was waiting for them to fall asleep to sneak up to Eric. There was no way he was going to be hobbling down quietly on crutches to the guest bedroom tonight. Through the heating vent, she could hear them arguing, their voices falling almost unfiltered through the ducts. She'd had no idea there was so clear a line of communication between these two bedrooms, and she felt suddenly abashed about the sex she and Eric had shared in this very bed the last time she visited. She hoped his parents had been asleep back then. She certainly didn't remember hearing them talking.

"Eric's lost his chance at the NFL," Mr. Taylor was saying, "but he could at least settle for a career as a successful businessman. Instead, he's going to teach history! History! No thought for the future, that boy!"

"James, you yourself said they came up with a good financial plan for their future."

"For a few years, sure. To get them _through_. But it's not ambitious. I tried to give that boy ambition."

"Why? So he could realize all the dreams you didn't? Maybe he has _different_ dreams, James. Did you ever think of that?"

"I just want the best for him. What's wrong with that? They shouldn't be getting married this young. Eric should establish himself first."

"You have to admit, Tami has been good for him. He's really come into his own since he's been with her."

"Come into his own?" Mr. Taylor scoffed. "That boy hasn't hadn't an opinion of his own since he started dating her. He goes to the inferior college she wants him to go to. He agrees to get married in the church she wants to get married in. When she says, _Climb a tree_ , he asks, _How high_?"

"Well he never won a State Championship until he was dating her, did he? And she didn't ask him to climb that tree. Some little boy did."

"He did it to _impress_ her. Rescuing a kitten. In a fragile tree. With snow. In winter! And there goes his future." Through the vent, Tami could even here the snap of Mr. Taylor's fingers. "And how could you just offer to pay for their wedding like that! Without _discussing_ it with me first!"

"Well, James, I'm working full-time now, and I suppose I may do with my own money what I like. I'll pay you back for the check you wrote, if you want."

"I've always considered my money to be _our_ money. You know that! But you should at least have _consulted_ me first."

She huffed. "Like you've always consulted me before you make financial decisions?"

"Betty, dear, I studied business and accounting. I'm in management. You're a _nurse_."

"You say it like it's nothing! Like you have no respect for what I do!"

For a while, Tami could only hear the sound of footsteps and drawers opening and slamming shut.

"Enough," Mr. Taylor said. "I don't want to fight."

"Well maybe _I_ do!" Mrs. Taylor shouted.

"Excuse me?"

"That's how this has always worked, hasn't it? You say you don't want to fight, and then it's over. And I go along with it, even though nothing is actually resolved!"

"What are you talking about, Betty?"

"My counselor told me that I shouldn't sublimate my own desires so much."

"Did he now?" Mr. Taylor asked. "Is that what happens in your little counseling sessions? He tells you what an awful husband you have?"

"No one said anything about – "

"-Is that how you feel? That I've just ridden roughshod over you all these years? I suppose that's why I quit the AFL for you."

"What? You didn't quit," she said. "You just didn't get picked up by the NFL after the merger."

"And why do you think that was, Betty, with my record?"

"I don't know. A lot of players were getting cut."

"Not players like me."

"What are you saying?" she asked.

"I'm saying, you _wanted_ me to quit professional football, and I damn well knew it. It was hard on you, me being gone so much, and you with the little one at home. I knew how unhappy you were. And you worried about the women, the temptation – though I never succumbed. But you worried. So I took the package and I stepped aside. I took myself out of the running."

"You never told me that. You told me no one wanted to pick you up."

"Because I knew if you knew the truth, you would - what did you call it? _Sublimate_ your own desires. You would have insisted I play, but then you would have been miserable. So I just told you I didn't have the opportunity, and I left it at that."

"You… _what_? But football was your _life_."

" _You_ were my life. You still are. I love you more than football, Betty. I always have. If you don't know that by now…I'm sorry. I don't know how to communicate that."

"Well, _words_ would work. Like the ones you just used." She laughed. "I always used to tell Eric that, when he was little. _Use your words_. I never thought I should have to tell _you_ that."

Mr. Taylor's was suddenly louder, closer: "Why is this vent open? We need to keep it closed so the first floor will stay warmer."

There was a squeaking above as the vent closed, and then Tami heard only indiscernible murmurs.

 **[*]**

Tami waited twenty more minutes before sneaking to Eric's room. Their lovemaking had been cautious since he got the cast. She was always on top, carefully straddling him, and sometimes there were as many shouts of "Ow!" and "Sorry!" as there were of "O God!"

He woke up when she slid into bed next to him and curled up against his non-broken leg.

"I just want to talk," she said.

He yawned.

"Do you regret going to UH to be near me?" she asked.

"I regret trying to rescue that damn cat." He stroked her hair. "Look, if I've seemed a bit off lately, it's just, you know, my dream kind of imploded. I'm still adjusting to that."

"But…do you blame me for that?"

He raised his neck slightly to look at her. "Why would I blame _you_?"

"Because, if you had gone to UT, like your dad said – "

" - Tami, I love you, but you weren't the only reason I went to UH. I _never_ wanted to go to my father's alma matter. I don't want to be _him_. I want to be _me_. And I can be me with you." He kissed her. "And the truth is, even if I'd gone to UT…even if I hadn't fallen out of that tree…such a small percentage of guys get drafted." He shrugged. "This way I can always say I _would_ have made it, if not for that damn cat."

"And maybe you would have made it if you and I never met."

"Maybe. Or maybe I wouldn't even have gotten this far." He kissed her. "And I keep thinking…what if my dream had blown up, and I didn't have you? I'd of had _nothing_ left. And then I realized…as long as I've got you by my side, I can handle anything that comes my way. Anything."

She smiled and slid her hand into his boxers. He closed his eyes and moaned softly. "I thought you just wanted to talk."

She kissed his earlobe and whispered, "Well, we can still _talk_."

" _Dirty?_ "

"Mhmhmmm…"

 **[*]**

The next evening, Tami went out onto the Taylors' back porch where Mr. Taylor was smoking a cigar alone. They had an outdoor fireplace built into the stone wall of the half-covered patio, and the flames were leaping high.

The Taylors had a much lovelier house here in Odessa than they'd had owned in North Dillon. It had two stories, four bedrooms, a grandiose eat-in kitchen, and a separate formal dining room. Eric's parents had always seemed middle class to her. They had lived in a middle-class neighborhood in North Dillon. They all drove used cars. Eric had worked part-time all through high school. Tami wondered how much Mr. Taylor had banked while he played for the AFL, if he could afford this house and still write $6,000 checks with a flick of the wrist. Most professional football players blew through their money and ended their careers in debt. Eric had told her his father had invested half of his income. Maybe those investments were paying off now.

She sat down at the outdoor table across from Mr. Taylor and pushed him the check. "We don't need it," she said.

"Don't need it or don't want it? I'm going to guess the latter, because I'm pretty sure you _need_ it."

"We'll find a way. It'll be a _very_ small wedding."

"You'll break my wife's heart if she can't send her son off in style. Take it, Tami. Humble thyself."

"This isn't about humility."

"Yes it is. For both of us."

"I'm not too proud to take your money," she told him. "But no one wants a gift that's given grudgingly. I know you don't like me. I know you wish I'd never dated your son."

"I _never_ said _that_."

"It doesn't _need_ to be _said_."

"Well then this does." He set his cigar in his ash tray. "My wife is fond of you, and I can see that you've made my son happy. Maybe he's not making quite the decisions I would like to see him make, but he's happy. I love my family. And my family loves you." He nudged the check back toward her. "Take the gift, even if the giver is imperfect – even if he's a little proud, a little closed-off at times. You're committing yourselves to one another for life. That's a very big thing. There's no reason you have to do it in a very small way."

Tami looked down at the check. She picked it up. "Are there strings attached to this money?"

"Yes. One."

Tami sighed. Not the church again. "What's that?"

"I get to dance with the bride."


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter Twelve**

Eric's teammates took him out for a night of heavy drinking to mourn his impending loss of freedom, but he had a second bachelor's party two weeks later when he returned home to Odessa for part of the summer. It consisted of only three guests. His best friend Grady came, since he had also come home to Odessa for the summer, as did his cousins John Paul and Philip Andrew. They made a bonfire on a gravely inlet down by the creek, and Philip Andrew brought some beer he'd brewed in the bathtub, which he poured out in plastic cups.

"Your dad lets you get away with brewing beer at home?" Grady asked. "And you're, what – only 18?" Philip Andrew was graduating from high school in a week.

"He sees it as an expression of Philip Andrew's love for learning," John Paul said. "My brother's very scientific about it. He can also quote you every Bible verse that praises beer."

"Because that would be none," Philip Andrew said. "The Bible does have quite a bit to say in support of wine, though."

"It's not bad," Grady said, "for bathtub beer. But don't you have like nine people in that house?"

"Six," Philip Andrew said. "Three of my brothers – including John Paul here - have moved on. Don't worry, though, it's all very sanitary."

"And when we run out of beer," John Paul said, "I've brought this." He reached into his backpack and pulled out a jar of moonshine.

"Damn," Eric said. "I haven't touched that stuff since grandma's funeral." John Paul had smuggled a jar of moonshine to the wake at the Taylors' house. The boys had been fifteen at the time, and they had both loved their grandmother, a warm and witty woman. The two cousins had gone outside into the woods and hiked through the fallen leaves to a ravine and toasted the old woman – several times.

Uncle Andrew had found them two hours later, vomiting into the creek. "Let me get you cleaned up, boys," he'd said. "And sobered up before your father sees you, Eric." He'd taken them in his car back to his own house. Eric didn't remember much after that, except that he'd woken up the next morning on a sleeping bag on the floor of the bedroom John Paul shared with Philip Andrew, his head screaming. Eric's uncle had drawn him aside that morning and had a good, long talk with him about drinking responsibly and never burying his grief in alcohol.

"That is the devil's liquor," Philip Andrew said.

John Paul laughed. "Oh, you're too pure, Philip."

"Nah. But that moonshine just shows you what evil is. Nothing but a perversion of good. Why have the perverted good when you can have the _real_ good?" He raised his cup of beer.

"Because sometimes you run out of the real good," John Paul said. "Besides, Eric's getting married tomorrow. We've got to celebrate that _somehow_."

"By making sure he looks terrible at his own wedding?" Philip Andrew asked.

John Paul shook his head, unscrewed the cap to his moonshine, and took a swig. "Oh, Christ," he said. "That's god awful." He put the cap back on and set it down on the ground. "When are the strippers coming? Are they going to burst through the woods?"

"Tami would have my head on a platter if I had strippers," Eric muttered.

"Yeah," Grady said, "me and the other guys on the team tried to drag him to a strip club for his other party a couple of weeks ago, but he dug in his heels." Grady made a cracking sound and flicked his wrist like a whip.

John Paul smirked. "Well, who needs strippers when your wife has a body like Tami's?" He cupped his hands in front of his chest in the shape of breasts.

"Hey!" Eric raised his beer cup and pointed it at him. Then he took his finger and drew a line in the dirt. "That's the line," he said. "Don't cross it."

"I wouldn't dare, cuz. But you've got to allow me to brush up against it every now and then. It's just my nature, you know. As a man among men."

Eric laughed. "This beer _really_ is pretty good."

 **[*]**

Tami's bachelorette party was equally tame. She went out to and early dinner with her sister Shelley, Angie, and her old high school friend Cindy. Tami and Angie had become fast friends over the spring semester. In April, they'd gone hunting for a two-bedroom apartment together, reporting back to the boys when they had narrowed it down to their top three choices. Grady and Angie would get the master bedroom and bathroom, while Eric and Tami would get the guest bedroom and second hall bath, since they would be paying a lower rent.

After dinner, they went back to Cindy's house – since her parents were out of town for the evening - and did each other's nails on the living room coffee table.

"I so have to pee," Shelley said and got up from the table.

"She's going to ruin her nails," Cindy murmured.

"My sister's giving me such a hard time about the maid of honor thing again," Tami said when Shelley was gone.

"Just demote me," Angie insisted. "I'll just be a bridesmaid. It's not worth the headache."

"Are you sure?"

"Tami, this is your day, girl. I'm not going to let your little sister ruin it with whining. t, blood is thicker than water."

After the nails, they watched _Better Off Dead_ on VHS. They split two bottles of white wine while they watched the movie, laughing so hard they could barely breathe. Shelley was the only one who wasn't laughing. She was grumpy because Tami wouldn't allow her more than half a glass of wine.

"Doesn't Lane look kind of like Eric?" Shelley asked.

"What?" Tami asked.

"John Cusak," Shelley said. "He looks like Eric."

"Maybe a little," Angie said, tilting her head. "In profile."

"No he doesn't," Tami insisted. "Besides, Eric is much better looking."

"Can I have more wine?" Shelley asked for the third time.

"Absolutely not," Tami insisted. "You're fifteen."

"You told me Eric's uncle let all his kids drink it at Thanksgiving."

"First of all, I'm not your parent. Second of all, Philip Andrew was the youngest one he let drink, and he was seventeen then." Tami knew it was legal to drink with your parents, but she'd still been surprised. Her mother would have a _fit_ if she knew Tami had been drinking alcohol at the age of seventeen, and there Philip Andrew was, asking his father, ever so politely, "May I have another?" and his father replying, "In an hour. You've had enough for now."

"I want my two sips of wine!" Angie cried. "Give me my two sips of wine!"

Everyone but Shelley laughed. "What?" she asked. "Is that supposed to be a play on the two dollars line in the movie?"

"Obviously," Cindy said.

"Why doesn't Lane just give the paperboy his money?" Shelley asked. "Is he as tight as Eric too?"

"He looks _nothing_ like Eric!" Tami insisted.

"You gotta admit," Cindy said, "he kind of does just a _little_ bit."

"Eric is way sexier," Tami insisted, "Especially when he's rescuing kittens."

Angie laughed. "This is good wine."

"So, speaking of guys," Shelley said, "I met Mom's beaux. She took me to Dallas for spring break just so she could spend time with him."

Tami had spent her spring break in Houston, apartment shopping with Angie and signing a lease and taking a two-day trip to the beach at Galveston.

Tami whirled on her. Why was Shelley only telling her this _now_. "Really? What's he like?"

"His name is _Antonio_ ," Shelley said, rolling every syllable. "He's Italian."

"No shit?" Angie said. "I'd have guessed Scottish."

"You told me that already," Tami said. "What's he _like_?"

"He's kind of short. Like, 5'8"."

"That's not that short," Angie said. "Grady's only 5'10"."

"He's got gray-black hair," Shelley continued, "and he's, I don't know, a little handsome I guess. Mom thinks so anyway. I think he's kind of…eh."

"But what's he _like_?" Tami insisted.

"I don't know. He's totally polite but he doesn't talk much. He pulls out her chair and opens doors for her and holds her coat and weird stuff like that. He's not a gambler or a heavy drinker like Dad," Shelley said. "He has a steady job. He seems to like Mom." She paused. "And he's never tried to molest me, so there's that."

"Good Lord, Shelley," Tami muttered.

"Well, that's what you _really_ wanted to know, isn't it?"

Tami refilled her wine glass. "Maybe," she admitted. "Is it serious? Is he coming to my wedding?"

"He's in El Paso on business for the next two weeks, so I doubt it."

Tami let Shelley drive them home, even though she only had her learner's permit, because Tami was buzzed. They snuck into the house, glad their mother was already sleeping. Tami waited until Shelley had gone to bed to call Eric from the kitchen phone and have drunken phone sex with him. He'd apparently had more to drink than her, because halfway through what she imagined to be a very sexy monologue on her part, he started to snore. She shook her head, hung up, and went to bed.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter Thirteen**

Eric was going to strangle this photographer.

He'd been told he and his groomsmen had to come to the church two hours before the wedding to "get ready." He had no idea what Tami was doing in that other Sunday School room, but Eric and his guys were fully dressed and ready to go in under twenty minutes.

Then the photographer had come in and started molding them into ridiculous poses and snapping away. This had gone on for almost an hour, or so it felt. Now the man was insisting that Eric sit on a stool and hold one of those hour-glass sand timers, and look at it with fear, as though his very freedom were running out, while his groomsmen stood about with shocked expressions.

"It'll be funny," the photographer insisted.

"It'll make us look like idiots," John Paul said.

Philip Andrew looked up from the book he'd brought, which he was reading between shots. "It'll be insulting to Tami. Eric's entering a holy union. Not a prison."

"Listen," Grady said, "the groom's had enough pictures. Why don't you go get the bride and the bridesmaids?"

"Umm….they're not letting me in yet," the photographer said. "But I have another idea. You're going to like this one."

 **[*]**

Tami admired her dress in the oval mirror and fretted over a few out-of-place hairs.

"You look gorgeous," her mother told her while Cindy handed Angie a hair pick who handed it to Shelley like they were on an assembly line.

Just as the hairs were arranged back in place, Betty Taylor popped into the room. After gushing over how beautiful Tami looked, she said, "James and I are so happy to be gaining a daughter today." She was half crying, and Tami couldn't help but hug her, even if it messed up her hair again.

"She's rather emotional, Eric's mother," Tami's mom observed when she was gone.

"Nothing wrong with that," Tami told her.

"I just find it strange," Ms. Hayes said, "given how reserved her husband and son are."

"Eric can be emotional," Tami said. "Just…in a manly way. Privately."

"In bed?" Shelley asked.

Tami glared at her.

"Don't be vulgar, Shelley," their mother told her. "I'm sure Tami's been a good girl and saved herself for marriage."

Thinking of how often Eric murmured _good girl_ in her ear when she came, Tami tried not to laugh. She wasn't sure her mother really believed her own words, but she didn't dare contradict them. Ms. Hayes needed her illusions.

 **[*]**

Once, when Eric had shown up late for football practice, his coach had made him do a ridiculous number of up-downs. When the drill finally ended, Eric had stood up and felt suddenly, overwhelmingly dizzy.

He felt like that now as he watched Tami walk down the aisle toward him. Her uncle, a man Eric had never met before yesterday, was giving her away. Her long hair flowed in carefully styled waves beneath her veil and over her bare shoulders, and the dress was so dazzlingly white that he had to blink. Grady put a hand on his shoulder and pressed down, as if to hold him in place, and from behind Grady, John Paul muttered, "Steady on now."

When Tami was facing him, Eric swallowed and smiled lightly. The pastor gave the welcome, and John Paul broke the groomsmen line to do the Scripture reading – not the "sexy reading" he had threatened Eric with at Thanksgiving, but the far more traditional: "Love is patient, love is kind...it is not self-seeking...it keeps no records of wrongs…" Eric didn't hear much of the passage.

The wedding sermon seemed to go on forever. Eric thought that a Catholic priest would have been more to the point. The couple exchanged traditional Protestant vows. Eric nearly dropped the ring when Grady handed it to him, but he managed at last to slide it unsteadily onto Tami's finger. When Eric was finally permitted to kiss his bride, he didn't want to pull away. She did first, blushing and laughing.

 **[*]**

The reception followed at Bob's Steakhouse. After the newlywed couple shared their first dance, the floor was opened up to the guests.

To save money, and to appease her mother, Tami did not have any alcohol at the reception. Some of the guests grumbled a bit about the fact. Even Tami's non-drinking father-in-law quipped about it. Tami overheard him telling a joke to his wife: "There are three truths about religion, my love. Jews do not recognize Jesus as the Messiah, Protestants do not recognize the Pope as leader of the Christian faith, and Methodists do not recognize one another in the liquor store."

When Mr. Taylor claimed his dance with her, Tami asked, as he led her about the floor, "How many Methodist jokes do you have?"

"Well, I have Catholic jokes too."

"Really? Tell me one."

He twirled her out of the way of Shelley and Philip Andrew. It wasn't clear who was leading that dance. It looked like Shelley might be. "How many Catholics does it take to screw in a light bulb?"

"I don't know. How many?"

"None. They use candles."

She smiled slightly. The conversation lagged as they continued to dance, so she said, "So this must be where Eric gets his dancing talent from."

"Well, it depends on the type of dance. My wife talked me into Cha Cha lessons once. The adventure did not end well."

Tami laughed.

"Your new husband," Mr. Taylor told her, "attempted break dancing the summer before his sophomore year of high school."

"No."

"Oh, yes. He bought himself a book. And some Betamax tapes. Back before we got the VHS. That was another adventure that did not end well. He sprained his wrist."

"Do you have photographic evidence?" Tami asked.

"My wife may have a shot or two of one of his performances. She'll sell them for a price."

Shelley twirled by again with Phillip Andrew, who appeared quite perplexed by whatever she was saying.

"My poor nephew," Mr. Taylor said. "Your sister won't leave him alone. That's their second dance. And he really just wants to sneak off into a corner and finish his copy of _St. Augustine's Confessions_."

Tami found herself laughing yet again. "You're in a surprisingly good mood." If he weren't a non-drinker, and if there had been any alcohol available, she would have thought he was buzzed.

"Well," he glanced toward a corner of the steakhouse where Betty Taylor was talking to Tami's mom, "My wife looks especially beautiful today, don't you think?"

"She does."

"And, despite going through an entire box of tissues during the wedding, she's happy. And that makes me happy." He gracefully sidestepped Shelley as she nearly crashed Philip Andrew into them.

Mr. Taylor nodded his head to Tami slightly when the music stopped and went to ask his wife to dance to the next song.

Shelley went on to dance with nearly all of Eric's other cousins, – first Peter Francis, then his twin brother Nathan Gregory, then John Paul, and finally Geoffrey. Geoffrey, oddly, didn't have a middle name, at least not one that Tami knew. The youngest of Eric's male cousins, Stephen Patrick, actually _asked_ Shelley to dance, but she turned up her nose because he was a mere 8th grader.

Phillip Andrew, meanwhile, hid out by the punch bowl, next to John Paul, who was just then telling Tami that she looked "absolutely stunning" in her wedding dress.

"Don't let your girlfriend-of-the-hour hear you say that," Tami told him.

"I didn't bring a girlfriend," John Paul said. "Although…." He glanced across the room at Cindy. "Does your bridesmaid have a boyfriend?"

"No," Tami told him. "And she did tell me she thought you have a fantastic voice for radio."

"Well, at least she didn't say I have a _face_ for radio."

"But I wouldn't wish you on her," Tami said with a smile. "Because I know it won't last a week."

"But it might be the best week of her life," John Paul suggested.

Philip Andrew sighed. "You should date a nice Catholic girl for a change."

"So should you," John Paul said. "Or _any_ girl for that matter. Just look up from your books for a moment. You might find one."

Just then, Shelley suddenly appeared before them. "You want to dance?" she asked Philip Andrew.

"Uh…. _again_? We just…"

Shelley grabbed Philip's hand and tugged him toward the floor. He was spared only by the announcement that the dinner and toasts were about to begin and everyone should take their seats.


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter Fourteen**

As best man, Grady began the toasts - complete with sparkling cider. "I remember when Eric first started tutoring this girl in high school," he said. "He kept using all these buts. Grady, man, she's beautiful, _but_ ….She's smart, _but_ …She's compassionate, _but_ … That's how I knew he was in love with her."

Tami laughed and took Eric's hand.

"They had some obstacles on the way," Grady said. "But they got back on the road, and I think it's gonna be a long road for you two. A really long road you'll be traveling together. So congratulations." He raised his glass.

Next, Shelley gave the maid of honor toast. Tami braced herself for whatever nonsense her sister was going to say. "Eric, you and I don't always get along," she said. "You hog the TV. But I can see you love and respect Tami and she loves you, so I'm happy for you both. Congratulations and good luck." When she sat down, Tami turned to Eric.

"That's it?" he asked.

"Thank God," Tami muttered.

There was of course no father of the bride toast, but, to her surprise, her father-in-law rose for a short speech. "Tami," he said, "I'm pleased to be welcoming you to our family today."

Tami wondered if he meant that, or if they were mere rehearsed words.

"Eric, son, treat her well. If you have sons, they'll learn how to treat their own wives by the way you treat her. If you have daughters, they'll choose husbands who treat them the way you treat her. And she's no wilting violet, that one, so if you want to keep her, treat her well."

Eric smiled and nodded.

" _A wife of noble character who can find?_ " Mr. Taylor continued. " _She is worth more than rubies._ That's in the Bible somewhere." He glanced at the mother of the bride. "Catholics _do_ read the Bible, believe it or not."

There was laughter from part of the room, mostly Eric's family, but also some of their friends.

"Remember that, son. The Bible also says, _Husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself._ Remember that too." Mr. Taylor looked at his own wife. "Marriage will transform you," he continued. "Both of you. Let it." He raised his glass to the couple. "To the bride and the groom, to many happy years, and to mutual comfort through the unhappy ones."

 **[*]**

Eric and Tami honeymooned in Corpus Christi for three days, in a hotel on the beach, using their wedding gift money. It was oppressively hot, so they spent most of their time making love in their hotel bedroom and lounging at the indoor pool, though they did take late night walks along the beach. They might have taken a longer vacation, but Tami had to get back to Houston in time for summer school.

[*]

The next semester was a blur. Tami crammed in a maximum course load of 21 credits. She skipped lunch and snacked on trail mix.

Meanwhile, Eric worked forty to fifty hours a week at the UH bookstore and tutored high school students for extra cash whenever he could. They were busy, but they were young. They had hungry sex on Friday and Saturday nights, and lazy sex on Sunday mornings, and it's-been-a-while sex on Wednesdays. They forgot to check-in with their parents and got worried monthly calls from their mothers.

Despite her heavy course load, Tami joined a sorority. Eric teased her mercilessly about it, reminding her of the comment she'd once leveled at Jenny about "buying friends," and Tami claimed she was only joining because the sorority did "really important volunteer work."

Eric laughed. "Really?"

"Yes. And, well…I _like_ to go to parties. I'm studying _so_ much. It's one way to blow off steam."

He smiled. "I can think of another."

Eric's social calendar was considerably more limited. He mostly restricted himself to attending football games and playing Thursday night poker with Grady. When he did go to parties with Tami, he nursed his beer, and every few minutes, he would ask, "Are you ready to go yet?"

"I don't understand why you don't like parties," she said as he was driving them home one night from one of her sorority functions.

"Because the only reason to go to parties is to pick up girls, and I already have a girl."

"That's not the only reason to go," she insisted. "There's dancing, and talking, and people. Don't you like to see people?"

"I see people every day. There are people everywhere I go. Lots of people at football games."

"Yeah, and you like that! So what's the big difference?"

"Can't we just stay in next weekend? Grady and Angie don't go out every weekend."

"Fine," she grumbled, though staying in turned out to be fun. The four of them drank beer and played Monopoly at the kitchen table in their cramped breakfast nook.

Tami leaned against Eric's shoulder and kissed his cheek. "I'll give you St. James for Park Place."

Grady laughed. He'd built quite an empire for himself of the light blues and dark purples. Angie had called him a slum lord.

"Hardly a fair trade," Eric said.

Angie smirked. "Throw in a blow job and I bet he'll make the deal."

Eric flushed.

"Yeah," Grady said. "How do you think I got both my monopolies? I had to promise a _lot_ of sexual favors." He winked at Angie and she rolled her eyes.

The next Friday, Tami asked Eric to accompany her to another sorority function. "I volunteered to take an overtime shift at the bookstore Friday," he told her. It was open until eleven on weekends, because it also had a coffee shop where a lot of students hung out. "We need the money."

"Fine. I'll just go with my sorority sisters then."

 **[*]**

Eric got a call on the bookstore phone at ten on Friday night. There was a lot of noise in the background. "Where are you?"

"In the kitchen," Tami said. "At this party at Tri-Delta." That wasn't even her sorority. "Can you please pick me up? Please!" She was slurring her words. He'd never heard her do that before. She'd get buzzed, but he'd never heard her sound like this. She was cautious about drinking too much too often because of her father's history.

"Babe, are you drunk? Already?"

"Please! Can you hurry?" He could only half make out what she was saying through the slurred speech, but he gathered the punch had been stronger than she expected and that some guy was creeping her out.

"I'll be there as soon as I can."

He kicked the kids out of the coffee shop, locked up the bookstore without emptying the register, and peeled off in his truck. He ran two red lights. It was a miracle he wasn't pulled over by campus police at either UH or MWU. He scoured the houses for Greek letters, dodging drunk kids until he found Tri-Delta. When he got inside, he couldn't find her. He weaved through the kitchen and living room calling her name, and he had just about decided to start busting down bedroom doors when he spied her through the sliding glass door on the back porch, up against a wooden pole that supported the awning, trying to put off some guy who kept placing his hand on her hip after she would weakly slap it off.

Eric slid the door violently open, grabbed the guy by the back of his neck, and shoved him into the brick wall at the side of the house.

"Damn!" the kid cried, holding his bloody nose. "What the hell is wrong with you?"

"She's not interested."

"Is she your girlfriend or something?"

"She's my wife!"

He grabbed Tami's hand. He had to half support her through the house and to the truck.

"You didn't have to break his nose," she slurred when they were driving.

"You said he was creeping you out."

"Not that guy. Another guy."

"Well, _that_ guy looked like he was trying to take advantage of you. What the hell, Tami? Why were you there alone? I thought you were going to be at your sorority."

"A couple of my sisters wanted to go to this party. But then they ditched me."

When they got home, he helped her to bed. He took off her shoes but otherwise left her in her clothes, and then he pulled the comforter up over her.

"The room's spinning a little," she said. "You might have to be romantic tonight and hold my hair. Oh God." She scooted over the side of the bed and vomited on the floor.

"Damn, Tami." He went to the kitchen where Grady kept the cleaning supplies in neatly labeled containers under the sink.

"Is Tami okay?" Grady asked. He was sitting at the kitchen table, doing his accounting homework.

"Where's Angie?" Eric asked. "Why didn't Angie go with her?"

"Angie's not her babysitter, man. Angie's already in bed. She has her internship interview at 7 AM tomorrow morning."

When he got back to the bedroom, Eric wiped up Tami's face with a washcloth while she lay on her back groaning, and then he scrubbed down the carpet. He brought her a glass of water and told her, "Small sips."

When he got in bed next to her, he said, "Don't go to anymore parties without me, okay?"

"You never want to go."

"I'll go, okay? I'll go. Just…don't go without me again, okay? You wanna get drunk, get drunk with me. Me or Angie or Grady. Someone you can trust."

"I didn't think…I didn't think I was drunk until I was."

"Did anything happen to you? Did that guy - "

"- No."

When she lay back down, he slid close to her and held her tight. "Damn, Tami."

"You're working **_so_** much lately. Overtime at the bookstore, tutoring on top..."

"I'll scale back. We'll go out more together. Whatever you want. Just don't put yourself in that situation again. Okay? Please?"

"Okay," she said, and then, "I feel sick."


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter Fifteen**

Eric did scale back his work hours a bit, but Tami also scaled back the party-going. They had more quiet evenings at home. By the spring semester, Tami was spending even more time studying. Meanwhile, Eric was working out violently, trying to get back in shape so he could try out for the Cougars when he went back to college. Sometimes he would press himself too hard, until he was in real pain, and he and Tami would fight about it.

In May, when Tami graduated a year early from MWU with "high honors," her mother took a dozen photos and told her, "I'm so very proud of you!"

As they walked to the car to go to dinner, Eric trailing quietly behind them, Tami's mom put an arm around each of her daughters, Tami in her cap and gown, and Shelley in a spring dress, and said, "I need to tell you girls something. I'm getting married."

"What?" asked Tami, coming to such a sudden stop that Eric nearly bumped into her.

"It was bound to happen," Shelley said. "Or haven't you been paying attention?"

Tami had _not_ been paying attention, in point of fact. She'd been so busy this past year that she hardly knew what was happening in the lives of either her mother or her sister.

Eric and Tami went to the Dallas wedding in July, and Tami was shocked to discover herself attending a traditional Catholic ceremony.

"Well, what did you expect from a guy named _Antonio Merretti_?" Shelley asked at the reception, which was being held in an upscale restaurant inhabited by circulating, tuxedoed waiters.

"I feel like I've just entered the Twilight Zone," Tami said. "I don't even know that woman who was her maid of honor. And are they serving _wine_?"

"Of course they're serving wine," Shelley told her, grabbing a glass off a passing tray. "Only you and Eric would be so gauche as to have an alcohol-free reception."

"But Mom doesn't drink!"

"No, but _Antonio_ does. He's not a drunk, though. I promise you. He's actually an okay guy. I like him."

Tami plucked the wine glass from her sister's hand. "You're too young." She sipped the wine and said, "How could so much change so fast?"

Shelley shrugged. "Things change. I'll be finishing high school in Dallas, for one. That's a hell of a lot different from North Dillon. I hope they have hotter guys."

"I don't know," Tami said, "North Dillon has always had an unusual number of attractive guys."

From beside her, Eric said, "You've got me to prove it."

"You're from Odessa," Shelley said. "You aren't representative. But Odessa does have some _really_ hot guys. Just look at all your cousins, Eric. How is Philip Andrew by the way?"

Eric just sighed, so Tami answered. "He's at St. Edward's University in Austin," Tami said. "Living with John Paul, who's finishing up his theater major at UT."

Shelley grabbed an appetizer from a passing tray. "What's Philip's major?" she asked before she popped the bacon wrapped scallop into her mouth.

"Catholic Studies," Eric said. "With a minor in Philosophy. Not your sort of thing."

"Well, it sounds interesting," Shelley said. "Do you happen to have his phone number?"

Eric shook his head and walked away.

Tami walked the perimeter of the reception hall, chatted with her uncle and a cousin, and then settled in a corner to watch her mother closely as she danced with her new husband. She felt a strange sense of disconnection. She had been so glad to move away from home, to escape that small town and her mother's moral lectures, and she hadn't seen the transformation that had unraveled while she was gone. Her family was pulling away from her, and she was forging a new one with Eric. It was like a country falling and a new one being built - there was something sad and beautiful in it at the same time.

"Hey, you a'right?" Eric asked softly as he drew up next to her and slipped an arm around her waist

"Yeah. It's just...it's weird you know. My _mother_ is _married_."

"He seems a'right."

Tami nodded. It was hard to judge, from a one time meeting, but Antonio was polite and respectful, conducted himself soberly, appeared to be quite fond of her mother, and apparently had a decent income. She couldn't really ask for more for her mother. He just didn't seem her mother's type. Catholic. Sophisticated. Foreign. Well, he wasn't really foreign. He'd immigrated here when he was a child. But he wasn't exactly a Texan either. Tami had always imagined, that if her mother were ever to re-marry, it would be to some ultra-conservative, smarmy, wide-grinning Texas minister, not an Italian Catholic corporate middle manager.

Eric kissed the bare skin between her shoulder and her neck. "You look really pretty in this dress."

She smiled, turned, and kissed him. She tugged at his tie. "You don't look half bad yourself. I almost hate to take this off of you later."

He grinned and pushed against the small of her back, guiding her to the dance floor.

[*]

In August, Tami secured a full-time job as a junior high school guidance counselor, "for last names I through P," as she told her mother on the phone.

"Big school?" her mom asked.

"It's Houston."

She was nervous on her first day, her stomach dancing with butterflies, but it went well enough. She ended up doing more scheduling and paperwork than counseling, which disappointed her, but the job paid the bills.

Eric quit his bookstore job to take his turn in college, though he continued to tutor occasionally for extra cash. He also tried out for the football team as a walk-on. He made the cut, but there was no scholarship involved. Sometimes his leg still hurt, and he struggled to keep up with the other players who had never had to sit out a year. He was left to warm the bench. During games, he would watch the coaches on both sides, observing how they interacted with the players and with each other, and wondering about their calls and whether or not he would have made different ones.

Frustrated with his lack of play time and his fall from glory, he quit the team at the end of his sophomore season.

"Are you sure you want to do that?" Tami asked him in bed one night, when he told her his plan. "You love football."

He was spooned against her, and he kissed her cheek. "Training and practice and the travel...it takes up way too much time. What's the point if I don't get to play? Time to focus on my education. I'm getting Cs. Need to do better."

Tami rolled over in his arms, put a hand on his cheek, and looked him right in the eyes. "I think you're going to regret this."

"Nah, I'm not. Listen. I asked Coach if I could shadow him at home games and one practice a week. It won't take nearly as much time as being a player. Won't be traveling for away games or doing all of the training. But I'll learn how to coach. He said yes, long as I'm willing to fetch things and assist him in other ways without pay."

He sounded so excited about the opportunity. "You've decided that's what you want to do now? For a living?"

He nodded eagerly. "Well, and teach. Have to. Coaching doesn't pay that much, especially the first few years, when I'll just be an assistant." He smiled. "But if I ever get to be head coach of a college team, I'm buying you a huge house with a pool and taking you to Bermuda."

She laughed and kissed him, a long lingering kiss with a little bit of tongue. She pulled back and asked, "You know I don't _need_ a huge house, right?"

He rolled her onto her back and eased a leg between her legs and rubbed his half formed erection against her hip. "As long as other things are huge, right?"

She groaned. "You are so sophomoric sometimes."

"Well," he told her, "I _am_ a sophomore." And then he peppered her neck with kisses, until she was giggling and squirming.


	16. Chapter 16

**A/N: _Thank you for all feedback. I am going on vacation, so it may be a week before I update this story._**

 **Chapter Sixteen**

One morning, as Eric was just beginning his junior year of college, Angie approached him in the kitchen.

"I know," he said. "It was my turn to mop the kitchen floor yesterday. I forgot."

She leaned against the counter. "It's okay. Listen, my youngest brother is a quarterback in Pop Warner." Angie was from Houston, and her family lived nearby. "I was wondering if you could give him a few pointers? He'd really appreciate it."

Eric agreed, and she told him where to meet the next morning, early, in a park a couple of miles outside campus. When he got there, he saw that the park had fields, and there was an entire Junior Pee Wee team of kids aged eight to ten milling around. Angie was nowhere to be found.

A man in a silver cap that sported the logo of a bullet approached him. "Are you Eric Taylor?" he asked.

"Uh…yeah."

"Good, then you must be my new volunteer assistant coach." He held out his hand. "Pablo Martinez."

"What?" asked Eric, shaking his hand absently.

"It's just the two of us handling this team. Practices are four days a week, Tuesday through Friday, 6:00 AM sharp, before school to beat the heat. Angie said you didn't have any classes until 9:00, right?"

"Uh, no…I don't…but…she didn't say anything about – "

"- Games are on Thursday afternoons. Great to have you on board." Coach Martinez turned to the milling team. "Bullets! This here is Coach Eric Taylor. You listen to what he has to say, and you show him some respect. Now let's welcome our new coach."

"Welcome, Coach Taylor!" the boys all shouted in unison.

As shocked as Eric was by the turn of events, he felt a strange surge of excitement when they chanted his name like that.

"So let's get started!" Coach Martinez hollered. "Bullets! Line up!" He turned to Eric. "You'll be working with the offense today."

 **[*]**

The junior high where Tami worked was three miles from the park. Eric went to Tami's office and shut the door. Her school wouldn't start until next week, so only staff was in the building currently, and he still had forty minutes before his first class started.

"I can't believe Angie did that to me!" he said after explaining what had happened. He whipped off the silver cap the head coach had given him and tossed it on her desk. " _Marketing_ major. I should have known she was selling me something. That's just damn sneaky is what that is."

Angie had graduated and now worked as a "promotional assistant" for the accounting firm where Grady had also recently been hired. Eric was the only one in the apartment who was still in college. With two jobs, Grady and Angie could easily have moved to their own apartment, but they'd decided to scrimp and save until they could put 20% down on a house.

Tami picked up his cap. "It's not a bad color on you. And you know, you want to be a coach. So it's a great experience."

"I didn't know what the hell I was doing with those kids half the time. And it's not a paid position. It's hours and hours a week, and I won't see a dime."

"You'll get the hang of it. Just try it for one season, sugar. I have a good feeling about this."

"Wait." He pointed a finger at her. "You knew about this, didn't you? You were in on it!"

She smiled and put the cap back on his head. "You look cute in a coach's cap," she said. "I bet you'll get laid after every game."

"I get laid anyway."

"Yeah, but I bet now you'll get to call all the plays."

He smiled. " _You_ should have been the marketing major."

Tami was right – Eric did get the hang of it. He fell in love with coaching and with those kids that season, and he volunteered again for the next; only, the next year, the head coach moved away and Eric was asked to fill the top slot. He talked Grady into volunteering to be his assistant.

 **[*]**

At the end of his senior year of college, Eric managed to graduate "with honors."

"Not _high_ honors like your wife, though," Eric's dad told him over dinner at an upscale French restaurant in Houston. It was where Eric's mother had wanted to celebrate his graduation. She'd read about it in some guide book. It was not the sort of place Eric and Tami could afford if the Taylors weren't paying.

"Well," Tami said, "he was a little busy taking the Bullets to the Regional Championships."

Mr. Taylor smiled indulgently. "He should have been going with the Cougars to a bowl game instead. He _might_ have been, if he hadn't quit the team."

"James!" Mrs. Taylor scolded him. "You know his injury never really healed properly. I didn't like him playing on it that one season anyway. Besides, he did a good job with those Bullets. Remember when you coached Eric's Pee Wee team that one year?"

Mr. Taylor nodded. "It wasn't easy," he admitted. "And it did take a _lot_ of time." He looked at Eric. "So what's your plan for the future, son?"

"I've started sending out resumes to schools all across Houston. I figure I'll teach history full-time and coach football part-time. I think I can get on as an assistant, at least at a junior high. Eventually, I want to be the head coach of a college team."

"All the way from an assistant coach at a junior high to the head coach of a university team." Mr. Taylor laughed. He glanced at his wife. "I guess I did give our son ambition after all."

 **[*]**

"Sometimes I hate my father," Eric told Tami in bed later that night. She was sitting up and reading a book on ADHD and education, and he was just sitting, his hands folded over his bare stomach just above his boxers.

"Don't make that mistake, sugar." She slid a marker in and closed her book. "I know he can be an ass sometimes. But he's dependable. And he _adores_ your mom. You gotta give him that much credit."

He sighed. "I guess."

"Listen. I know how bad a father _can_ be. Yours isn't _that_ bad." She shrugged. "And even I've forgiven mine. It's easier that way."

"Well, it's easy to forgive someone you never see. I still have to listen to him criticize me. I never want to be like that with my kids. Make them feel like…you know…they aren't good enough. I'm afraid sometimes that I will. That I'll just say things I shouldn't."

She put a hand on his shoulder. "You won't. You'll be an amazing father."

"Well, we have another five or six years before I have to worry about that. I'm so glad we're not having kids in our _early_ twenties, like my parents did." He switched off the light and kissed her in the dim glow of the moonlight filtering through the blinds. "You...uh...have a graduation gift for me?"

"What did you have in mind?" she asked. "Your call, Coach Taylor."


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter Seventeen**

"Hello, son, this is your father."

"Yeah," said Eric, leaning against the kitchen counter where they kept the phone. "I know." That voice was hard to mistake – deep, Southern, and commanding.

"Listen, I called because I failed to adequately congratulate you for – " His voice became fainter, as though he'd taken the phone from his mouth. "Relent, woman. I _will_ tell him. Why do you think I'm on the phone?" The fullness of his voice returned. "- to adequately congratulate you on – "

" - Dad, I don't need you to give me the little rehearsed speech Mom wrote for you. Is she gone now? Because, if so, you can just tell her you said whatever she wanted you to say."

There was a long silence. "Fine, I won't give you her speech. I'll give you my own, although it won't be nearly as pretty."

Eric sighed and braced himself for the criticism.

"You accomplished something I never did, Eric. You earned your B.A."

"What? You have your bachelor's. You studied business and accounting at UT-Austin. I've only heard that a hundred times."

"I did, but I didn't quite finish. I quit college to work when your mom told me she was pregnant. We desperately needed the money. But right before you were born, I made it to the AFL. So I never actually finished my degree."

Eric shook his head. How could he not have known this? It's true he'd never seen a diploma hanging in his father's office, but he'd never looked for one either. "How did you get those big administrative jobs without a degree?"

"It was a different time. Performance meant more than paper. I proved myself, and now that I have experience and a solid reputation, I don't need the paper."

Angie came into the kitchen and Eric stepped aside to let her get in the fridge.

"I always hoped you would accomplish what I didn't and finish your degree," his father said. And you did. With honors."

"Not _high_ honors like my wife, though, right?" That comment had stung more than Eric wanted to admit.

"Well, that girl is exceptional. Anyway, I just called to say congratulations on your degree. And congratulations on taking your Pee Wee team to Regionals last season. You're a good student and a good coach."

"Okay." Eric didn't know quite how else to respond. He wasn't accustomed to his father's praise. "Well, I have to go. I've got a job interview."

When he got off the phone, Angie was eating breakfast at the table and asked, "How many positions have you applied for?"

"All eleven openings in Houston. Six for history teachers, and five for P.E. teachers. And this is the only interview I got. Tami loves her work here." He poured himself a cup of coffee. "She doesn't want to move. I damn well better get this job."

 **[*]**

Houston ISD gave the position to someone else, so Eric started applying all over the state. He found a full-time job teaching 7th grade history at a large junior high in San Antonio. They would also give him a small stipend to be an assistant coach for the football team.

When he told Tami about the opportunity, she wasn't thrilled. They argued about it for a week.

"At least it's a city," he said one day. "It's got some culture."

"And the second highest drop-out rate among the fifty largest school districts in Texas." She'd clearly been doing research.

"But I'll be teaching junior high. There won't be much dropping out."

"Yeah, but I might be a high school guidance counselor. I'll have to deal with a _lot_ of problems."

"Well, isn't that what you want?" he asked. "To _help_ kids? And hey, San Antonio has that pretty Riverwalk. We can have romantic strolls. You _like_ romantic strolls. We could go punting. Not footballs. I mean, boats."

"The teacher's salary they're offering, even combined with your coaching stipend – it's no more than what I'm _already_ making here."

"But it's San Antonio," he said. "Cost of living will be a lot cheaper. And I have to start my career, Tami. I have to go where the job is."

"What about _me_? What about _my_ career? I'm doing good work here at my school! I'm making a difference! I'm - "

She was still yelling when he walked away.

 **[*]**

As Tami was digging her toast out of the toaster with a plastic knife, Angie leaned against the counter beside her and said, "How long are you guys going to be fighting? Grady and I would really like to get some sleep."

"Are we that loud?"

Angie nodded. "Even louder than when you have drunk sex. And you guys only get drunk once a month. This fighting has been every night."

Tami began buttering her toast. "He just doesn't get it," Tami said. "I don't want to leave my job."

"If you don't let Eric take this job, he's going to feel emasculated. And that's no good for your marriage."

"You and Grady just want the apartment to yourselves," Tami joked.

"We're moving out this summer anyway," Angie said. "We've been saving. We're buying a house. I just want you and Eric to be happy, and he's not going to be happy if he has to settle for working at the UH bookstore again. And you know what? You're not going to respect him either."

"Of course I will! It's honest work."

"Tami, you need a man who has a vision and who pursues it. You don't want a boy who's killing time at the bookstore. Don't turn Eric into that boy. You won't like him."

In the end, Tami quit her job and followed Eric to San Antonio. She told Angie and Grady, "Y'all come visit us."

"We'll take you to the Alamo," Eric said. "If I'm not already tired of all the class field trips there."

 **[*]**

The heat was oppressive when they started shopping for apartments. The couple caravanned down to San Antonio, all of their belongings in Eric's pick-up and Tami's sedan. They had sold their bedroom furniture in Houston and were planning to buy new stuff. Currently, they were living in an extended stay motel until they found a permanent place.

Tami kept insisting on looking at two-bedrooms, which Eric didn't understand. "We should get a cheap one-bedroom and keep saving up for a down payment on a house," he said while they stood in the master bedroom of one such apartment. "We don't know when you're going to find a job here." Tami had mailed out a lot of resumes without any nibbles. San Antonio had a teacher shortage, but they apparently weren't much in need of guidance counselors.

The landlord was lingering in the hallway while they talked. Tami took Eric's hand and dragged him to the farthest corner of the room. "We're going to need two bedrooms," she insisted.

"Why?"

"Because I'm pregnant."

He blinked. "Say what now?"

"Pregnant."

"With…with my child?"

"No, Eric, with the Holy Spirit's child. Yes your child!"

"But, we were going to wait until we could afford a house!" He dug a hand in his hair. "We were going to wait until I had at least four years of work under my belt. I haven't even _started_ work!"

"Well I guess we're not fully in charge."

Eric leaned in and whispered, "How did this happen? Was it that recall?" There had been a recall of defective birth control pills, and they'd switched to condoms temporarily. Tami was going to start a new pack when they got settled in San Antonio. They hadn't been particularly worried, because they'd only had sex once on that pack before the recall came down, and they weren't even sure her pills were defective.

"Maybe. Or maybe the condom didn't work one time."

He shook his head. "I don't even know if my health insurance will cover this. I think there might be a one year waiting period for pregnancy. How could this happen? This isn't what we _planned_."

The sound of a throat clearing caused them both to turn toward the doorway. "Excuse me," the landlord asked, "are you interested in the apartment?"

"No," said Eric, walking past the landlord and out the front door. Tami could hear him clattering down the stairwell.

He was waiting with the car running, windows rolled down, sweat on his brow. It was hot enough for him to break a sweat just sitting there, but it looked liked the news had broken him. Tami got in and buckled in. The silver buckle burned her hand. He started driving back to their motel without saying anything. He rolled up the windows once the air conditioning had a few minutes to start working.

When they got into the motel room, he went to the bathroom and washed his face.

When he came out, she said, "Eric, we – "

"- I need to go for a walk."

The door latched shut.

Tami slumped down in the chair in the tiny sitting room and cried.


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter Eighteen**

When Tami's tears were spent, she took a hot shower and changed into her light pajamas. For the first time in a month, she called her mother. Her mother had never been the nurturing type, but Tami felt suddenly like a child and didn't know where else to turn.

Antonio answered. Tami always felt awkward talking to the new husband. (No matter how long they were married, Antonio would always be "the new husband" to Tami.) He was pleasant enough, but she just wanted the formal exchange to be over. At last, her mother came on the line.

"How's Shelley?" Tami asked, not quite ready to broach the real subject.

"Well, you know, she's been working on that associate's degree in early childhood education. She should be done by January. We gave her a little apartment down in the basement, so she can have some privacy."

After some further conversation, Tami finally told her about the surprise pregnancy and Eric's reaction.

"Listen, Tami, when Eric asked for your hand in marriage, I thought you were both too young. But I also thanked God that he'd brought you someone decent. Someone with a sense of honor. Eric will come around. He will. I promise you that. He's just scared. And if he went for a walk, it was probably so he could get his head on his shoulders and be steady for you."

"I hope so."

"I know so. And if his health insurance has a waiting period, Antonio and I can help with the hospital bills."

"I don't want to take your husband's money."

"Why don't you like Antonio?"

"I don't dislike him. I just don't know him."

"You're unhappy I got remarried."

"No, Mom…I'm not. Really. It's just…weird. It's like…I grew up with you, and now we have completely different lives."

"That's time, sweetheart."

 **[*]**

Tami was sitting cross-legged on the bed when the door opened. Eric had a plastic shopping bag in his hands. She clicked off the television.

He sat down on the edge of the bed in front of her, reached into the bag, and handed her the object inside: a copy of _Dr. Spock's Baby and Childcare for the Nineties_. "The lady at the bookstore recommended it."

Tami laugh-cried and scooted closer.

He put a hand tentatively on her cheek and looked her in the eyes. "I'm really sorry I was such an ass about it. I just wasn't expecting that. Maybe you could have told me somewhere else, someway else? You gotta admit…your timing was odd."

"I was debating when and how to tell you, but you kept pushing about the one-bedroom."

He stroked her cheek with his thumb. "It's just…it's like I have all these plans. I try to set goals and timelines and be responsible. And things just happen. I broke my leg. I couldn't get a job in Houston. I got you pregnant at the wrong time."

"Well, when you coach, you don't just draw up one play, right? You make the calls on the spot when you need to. You have an entire play book."

He nodded. "You're right. I just don't know anything about being a dad. I thought I'd be five or six years older. Established. More mature."

"I don't know anything about being a mom either."

He searched her eyes. "I guess we'll figure it out together." He kissed her. "I'm really sorry for the way I reacted."

She didn't say it was okay, but she said, "I forgive you. And I'm scared too."

 **[FNL]**

Tami couldn't get a job in the San Antonio schools, but she did finally get an offer from a Women's Center. Over sixty percent of her pay would be eaten up in child care expenses, commuting, work clothes, and taxes. She hardly saw the point. She was so tired lately, and she couldn't imagine how exhausted she would be when the baby was born. She didn't like the idea of leaving her infant with strangers, either.

She decided to broach the subject of becoming a stay-at-home mom. She wasn't sure how Eric would react. He was accustomed to her contributing income – she'd been the primary breadwinner for those last three years he was in college in Houston, after all. On top of that, he was frequently worried about money and bills and saving for the future.

That evening, when Eric came home to their second-story, two-bedroom apartment, he walked the short, six steps from the front door and tossed his golden-brown Yellow Snakes cap on the L-shaped kitchen bar that surrounded the sink. The Yellow Snakes had the worst colors. She picked up his cap and set it next to the stove.

The kitchen opened onto a small breakfast nook, but they hadn't bought a table yet. She began to set the bar with plates. "I thought you'd be home earlier." Practice was in the early morning before school, because temperatures still exceeded 90 in the afternoon.

"Babe, I've only got one planning period during school. I'll be working late all football season."

"Well, dinner's ready."

They sat side by side on two bar stools and ate. She told him about the job offer and about her preference for staying home. "Just until the baby is in kindergarten," she said. "Then I'll go back to work. What do you think?" She awaited his response nervously.

"Well…bills are gettin' paid. The house fund isn't growing, but bills are gettin' paid. I might be able take on some private coaching. Some of these well-to-do parents, they get private coaches to work their kids out during the off season. My father never did that, but he worked me out himself, every morning before he went to mass."

"Your dad really spent a lot of time with you. Even before my dad was a drunk, I don't remember him playing much with us."

"Well, he wasn't _playing_ with me," Eric said. "He was _riding_ me. Hard."

Tami set her ice tea glass down. "He was always _there_. You don't know what it's like to grow up without a father around. Don't take yours so much for granted. A kid needs a father." She put a hand over her belly.

"I'll be there for this little one," he promised her. "I'm going to spend time with him, but I'm not going to ride him nearly as hard as my dad rode me."

"You really don't mind me staying at home?" she asked.

"A man takes care of his family." He looked nervous, even though he'd put on an air of bravado. He leaned in and kissed her. "Besides…I like you having more time for me."

She smiled. "Well, you require a lot of time, don't you?"

"Mhmmm….And a lot of attention."

Between the kisses, dinner got cold.


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter Nineteen**

Tami hadn't made it to Eric's game tonight. She was too tired. When he came home, he switched on the lamp and crawled into bed next to her. "You awake?"

She rolled over and yawned. "I am now." He still had his coaching cap on. She kissed him. "How'd you do?"

"We lost by a field goal."

"I'm sorry, sugar." She took his cap off and threw it on the floor and kissed him again. "And I'm sorry I didn't make your game."

"I understand. But since you're awake now, you want to…maybe fool around?" It had been awhile. Five days to be exact. Eric would claim seven days, but Eric always exaggerated his sufferings.

"Sure," she said, even though she wasn't precisely in the mood.

The lovemaking was lazy. He insisted she be on top because he didn't "want to hurt the baby." The foreplay put her in the mood, and, toward the end, she was whimpering, _Yes, Eric, please._

She drifted off to sleep in his arms afterward, though she woke when she felt him shift and get up. She rolled over and went back to sleep.

An hour later, she woke up again. He wasn't in bed. She made her way past the would-be nursery to their postage stamp of a living room where he was grading papers.

"You gave them a test on a game day?" she asked, sitting down on the couch next to him.

"Nah. These are from Tuesday. I just hadn't gotten around to all of them, with practice and all."

He was working so hard, teaching five classes, and putting at least twenty hours a week into the assistant coaching. She toyed with his hair. "I love you."

"I love you, too." He wrote a C on the top of the paper that rested on the coffee table, put a circle around the letter, and scrawled, _You're capable of a B+. 30 push-ups._

She leaned in and kissed him. "What do you want to name the baby?"

"What's wrong with Eric Michael, Jr.?"

"What if it's not a boy?" she asked.

"I really don't care, as long as it's not weird."

"How about Julia?"

"That's weird."

"What's weird about it?" Tami asked. "I think it's pretty."

"Sounds old."

"Well, it was the name of my grandmother."

"She was old," Eric said. "Didn't you say she was like 100 when she died?"

"Ninety. I adored her."

Eric kissed her hand on his shoulder. "Well, if it means that much to you, I don't care."

"If Julia sounds too old fashioned to you, we could call her Julie."

"Okay by me," he agreed. "But I have a feeling it's going to be a boy."

 **[*]**

Tami had largely escaped morning sickness, but her exhaustion was off the charts. One day, she crawled into bed at five o'clock in the evening and immediately fell asleep. She woke up seven hours later at midnight. Eric had the bedside lamp on. He was lying on his back, his head partially propped up by pillows, holding the Dr. Spock book above himself.

"I'm surprised you're reviewing a baby book instead of game tape." She hadn't touched the book since he'd bought it, because she'd been busy reading several books specifically about pregnancy. She figured she could dive into the child care stuff her last trimester.

"Well, I did that until ten. Then I tried to sleep and couldn't. Sorry if the light woke you up."

"I've been asleep since five," she said. "Did you get some dinner?"

"I finished off the lasagna from last night. It's even better the second time around."

She smiled. "Grady's old recipe."

"Listen to this: _There's no solid medical evidence to support routine circumcision_."

"Trust me, hon," Tami insisted, "if we have a boy, he's going to thank us for getting him circumcised. Or at least his girlfriend is."

"Says here circumcision can reduce sexual sensation for a guy."

"Boys don't really need any extra encouragement in that area, though, do they?" she asked.

He chuckled, rolled over with the book still in his hand, and kissed her. "Speaking of which..."

"We just had sex…um…" She tried to remember.

" _Six_ days ago," he said.

" _Love keeps no record of wrongs._ I think John Paul read that verse at our wedding."

"It's been six days, babe. And I've got a game tomorrow. And I can't get to sleep."

"Will you give me a back rub first? With the oil?"

He smiled. "Sure."

She expected _him_ to fall right asleep right after the sex, but _she_ did. When she woke up again at 2 AM, he still had the lamp on, and he was sitting up this time, against the headboard, reading. "Honey, you need to go to sleep. You've got to teach a class in six hours."

"This guy is crazy!" he said. "He thinks you should put your kids on a vegetarian diet! No kid of mine is ever going to be a vegetarian."

She sat up and peered at the book.

Eric flipped through the pages. "I mean this guy is nuts! He says if a kid cries in her crib until she vomits, you should just ignore her until she falls asleep and then clean up the vomit later."

"What? Put that book away! We're not using that book."

He shut it and set it on the nightstand.

"You _need_ to go to sleep, honey," she said.

He smiled. "You want to help with that?"

"It didn't work the first time."

"If at first you don't succeed…"

He settled for a blow job and fell asleep sixty second later.

Tami realized she hadn't eaten dinner, got up, and ate half a bag of potato chips, even though that wasn't in any of the recommended nutrition plans in any of her six pregnancy books. "There's your vegetarian diet, Dr. Spock," she muttered.


	20. Chapter 20

**Chapter Twenty**

* * *

 **[November]**

Now that she was pregnant and living a long way from her mother and sister and best friend Angie, Tami was thinking that a moral support system might not be a bad idea. Her neighbor invited her to a Bible study for new and expectant moms, and she enjoyed the first meeting, so she decided to try out the church that hosted it. She asked Eric to go with her.

"Did you like it?" Tami asked when they drove home from the service.

"It's…different," he said.

It was a nondenominational church. It wasn't _that_ different from the Methodist church she'd grown up in, except that it was less fundamentalist and more contemporary, but it was a far cry from the Catholicism with which Eric was familiar.

"I liked it," she said. "I want to go."

"Uh…okay. I guess we could do that."

They ordered pizza for lunch and watched football for a while. Eric was pretty engrossed in the game when the phone rang, so Tami went to answer it.

When she came back to the couch, she told him, "That was one of my students back in Houston. She's in high school now. I gave her my number before I left, in case she ever needed to talk."

Eric was staring at the TV. "Go! Go! Go!" He shouted as he stood up. "Yes!" Then he sat back down. "Sorry, what did you say?"

"A girl, from the old school in Houston. She was having some issues with her father. He was an alcoholic. So, you know, I could relate."

"Uh-huh."

She sighed, picked up the remote control, and clicked off the television.

"Hey!" He picked up the remote and turned the TV back on.

"Do you remember what the pastor said, sugar?" she asked loudly. "Back when we were getting premarital counseling? About how it's important not to zero in on some narrow interest of your own so that I don't feel neglected?"

He turned sideways and extended an arm across the back of the couch to face her. "You need to talk about this."

"Yes."

"And you need me to listen."

"Yes."

"I'm listening."

"Turn off the game," she insisted.

"I can listen with the game on."

"Do you have _any_ hope of getting laid this afternoon?"

While still looking in her eyes, he lifted the remote and clicked the television off.

 **[December]**

Tami stood in the center of the room and surveyed her handiwork. Eric, who had just gotten home from work, was still scolding her. "You should have asked me to do it. The fumes aren't good for the baby."

He'd read two chapters of one of her six pregnancy books last weekend, and now he was an expert.

"The baby will be fine. I kept all the windows open." It was a moderate December day, what many non-Texans might consider early fall weather. "And I didn't use oil-based paint."

Tami had gotten a huge burst of energy in her second trimester. She was bored staying at home all day with no projects. Last week, she'd started helping Eric grade papers. It gave him more time to watch game tape.

She'd chosen a neutral, unobtrusive yellow for the walls, so it didn't matter if the baby was a boy or a girl. The ceiling she'd done a sky blue. "We still need a theme," she said. "I was thinking Noah's Ark."

"God no," he said. "That's morbid. Bunch of wicked people running around the earth, so wicked God drowns them all to death."

She turned and looked at him. "Cute animals going two by two into a big boat. And rainbows."

"Is that your take away from that story?"

"It's _everybody's_ take away, Eric."

He shook his head. "Nope. Not doing it."

"How about clowns?" she said. "That's unisex."

"And incredibly creepy. Didn't you see _Poltergeist_ in high school?"

She had. She'd gone with her then boyfriend (who'd dumped her when she wouldn't put out), with Mo and his girlfriend, and with some other guy she couldn't remember. That was before she and Mo were dating, but Mo kept "accidentally" brushing her hand in the popcorn bucket.

She sighed. "We'll do a _Where the Wild Things Are_ theme then. I love that book."

"Damn, Tami, that's even creepier than clowns. There's something wrong with that book. That book's even worse than _The Giving Tree_."

She'd bought about fifteen children's books already – all of her own favorites as a child. " _The Giving Tree_ is a story of unconditional love, Eric."

"It's a story of abuse is what it is. Of a guy just using and using and using until there's nothing left to use. Stupid tree."

"Fine. What do you think we should do?"

"Well…what's wrong with a football theme?"

She snorted.

"No, really." He waved his hand toward the far wall. "We could paint some grass right there, draw in a field goal, put up a bunch of those football stick-up thingamabobs." He turned to the other wall. "Maybe a Cowboys helmet right there."

"What if it's a girl?"

"She can still play Powder Puff," he said. "But I have a feeling it's going to be a boy."

"You know, we can find out at my next appointment."

He turned back to her. "What? How?"

Clearly he hadn't read _too_ much of that pregnancy book. "Ultrasounds, Eric. They don't just use them for high risk pregnancies anymore. Do you want to find out?"

He looked around the nursery. "I guess we better."

She draped her arms around his neck and they kissed as the cool December breeze ruffled the lace curtains on the window. She pulled away and caressed the hair at the back of his head. "I don't know what's going on with these second trimester pregnancy hormones, sugar, but I'm horny as hell." She nodded to the sturdy, luxury glider that had been delivered yesterday. The return label had born the name of the new husband, Antonio Meretti, but Tami assumed her mother picked it out.

"Umm…" muttered Eric, following her eyes, "you're going to be rocking our baby to sleep in that chair. That just seems wrong."

"Then take me to bed. _Now_."

He did. Afterward, he lay with his hand resting on her bare stomach, his lips pressed against her shoulder. The warmth of his mouth vanished suddenly from her flesh. "Did you feel that?" he asked.

"Yeah," she said, smiling.

"Is that…is that the baby?"

She took his hand and moved it slightly.

His smile grew. "Wow. He can really kick." He slid his hand over her stomach, following the movements. "Special teams. It's not glorious, but it's important."

 **[January]**

Tami scheduled her ultrasound appointment during Eric's free period and lunch break so he wouldn't have to miss any school. He'd gotten a substitute for his next class, just in case the appointment ran late. He was sitting beside her and holding her hand now as the ultrasound appeared on the screen.

Smiling broadly, he pointed with his free hand. "It's a boy! Yep! See! I told you!"

The doctor laughed. "That would be quite impressive indeed. That's an arm, Mr. Taylor."

"Oh."

"It's _Coach_ Taylor," Tami said.

The doctor glanced at her and then glanced back at the machine. "Everything looks good," he said. "You have a very healthy little girl, Mr. and Mrs. Taylor."

Tami turned her head back to look at Eric. He was chewing on his bottom lip and staring at the screen.

The doctor stood up. "I'll see you in February, unless there are any issues, okay, Mrs. Taylor?"

Tami nodded. Eric let go of her hand when the door closed.

"Are you disappointed?" she asked.

"Nah." He bent his head down and whispered. "That's my girl. That's my little princess. Daddy can't wait to meet you." He kissed Tami's stomach. "Ewww!" he said, jerking his head up and wiping his lips. "What the hell?"

Tami laughed. "That's the gel they put on so they can do the ultrasound. I haven't wiped it off yet."

"Ugh."

"Hand me that box of tissues, sugar."

 **[April]**

"Ow! Ow! Ow!" Tami was limping around the bedroom again.

Eric rolled over and glanced at the clock. 2:30 AM.

"Charley horse!" she screamed.

How long was this going to go on? Last night it had been 3 AM with heart burn. And the night before, 1:30 AM with another charley horse. And on top of that, she was up twice a night to pee.

"C'mere," he muttered. "I'll massage it for you."

"No! I have to walk it out! Ow! Ow! Ow!"

He rolled on his left side, grabbed her pillow, and put it over his right ear. Spring training started at 6:30 AM sharp tomorrow morning. He needed his beauty sleep.


	21. Chapter 21

**Chapter 21**

 **[May]**

Julie Amanda Taylor came screaming into the world, and she didn't stop screaming for three months.

Colic, they called it.

Tami's mother came down from Dallas to help the first week, but Shelley replaced her the second.

After a week with Shelley sleeping on the couch in the living room, and Julie crying from six to eight every evening, Eric just needed a break. He called home when the school day was over, and for the first time in the course of their marriage, he outright lied to his wife. He could hear Shelley was running the vacuum cleaner in the living room. It was the only thing that settled Julie.

"I'm so sorry, babe," he told Tami, "I've got a department meeting this afternoon." That much was true. "But then I've also got this meeting with the administration and Coach Compton to go over some eligibility stuff for next season." That was the lie. "It's going to be really long. I probably won't be home until nine."

Around six, he walked into a pub and sat down with two co-workers at a four-person bar table. They ate dinner and threw back a few beers and talked while watching the TV screens.

"Yeah one of mine had colic too," Coach John Compton said. Eric respected the head coach and was learning a lot from his boss. The man was only forty-six, but he already had a full head of gray hair and the experience to go with it. He'd spent twenty-two years coaching at this same junior high, despite several offers to coach 5A high schools. He was firm but patient with the kids, demanding yet compassionate.

"One of mine too," said Mick McKinney, who was an 8th grade history teacher. "One weekend, I told my wife I had a two-day, continuing education seminar. I just stayed in a cheap motel all weekend long and slept and watched TV in peace and quiet."

"Well, well, well," came a voice from behind Eric. He turned around to see Tami's old boyfriend, Mo McArnold.

"Mo. Long time no see," Eric said with fake enthusiasm. "John, Mick, this is an old high school…uh…acquaintance of mine."

"Morris McArnold," Mo said, extending his hand to each of the men.

Mick McKinney pulled out a chair. "Want to join us?" he asked.

 _Oh hell_ , Eric thought.

Mo sat down. "What are you doing in San Antonio?"

"I'm coaching junior high football," Eric said. "And teaching 7th grade history."

Mo reached out and grabbed a passing waitress by the arm. "Bourbon. Neat. Your _best_."

"Sorry, but we don't have any bourbon."

"Okay," Mo said. "Your best whiskey then _._ " He winked at her.

Coach Compton raised his eyebrow.

"And what brings _you_ to San Antonio?" Eric hoped to God Mo didn't live here.

"Business," Mo answered, putting a hand on his knee. "I live in Houston now. But you know that Alamadome they're building?"

"We're familiar with the Alamadome," Coach Compton answered.

"Well, I'm one of the investors. So I'm here to meet with some people." He pulled out a card and slid it to Eric. It said: Morris McArnold, Real Estate Investment. "You can keep that."

Eric took the card warily. Mo had been a C+ math student in high school. When had he become interested in _investments_? Or real estate for that matter?

"I don't suppose you have a business card," Mo said. "Eric Taylor, Teacher. Assistant Junior High Coach."

Coach Compton looked cautiously from Eric to Mo.

Mo's whiskey arrived, and he downed it and hissed. "I'll have a second. How about you, Eric? Can I buy you one?"

"Nah," Eric said. "I'll just stick with this beer."

"Why?" Mo asked. "You got a curfew or something?"

Eric clinched his teeth.

"We all have curfews," Coach Compton said. "We've got wives and kids to get back to. Because we're grown-ups." He leveled his eyes at Eric, the way he did when he was getting ready to discuss an important play and he wanted his assistant's full attention. "We're not in high school anymore, right, Eric?"

"Wives and kids, huh?" Mo said. "You find yourself a little filly in college, Eric?"

"I found her in high school," Eric said deliberately. "You know. Tami."

Mo laughed loudly. He grabbed the waitress again and ordered Eric a shot of whiskey.

When the two drinks came, Mo raised his glass to Eric. "To congratulate you on your successful campaign."

Eric raised his glass warily and sipped lightly. He really wanted to tackle Mo right now, but he wasn't about to do it in front of his boss.

Mo set his empty glass down on the table. "I didn't think you and Tami would make it through college. I figured Tami would find someone else."

"Well she didn't."

"And you've got kids already?"

"One. Newborn. We've been married a few years. We got married right after Tami's sophomore year."

"Did you now?"

"Surprised you didn't hear about it," Eric said.

"Well I haven't been back home since I left for college. My folks moved to Austin." He nodded to the drink. "You gonna nurse that?" Mo asked.

Eric shot the rest of his whisky. Mo raised his hand to a passing waitress and asked for two more. "So, Tami _Taylor_ , huh? When these shots come, we're going to drink again to your success." He stared at Eric. "You always were good at the quarterback sneak."

Eric really, really wanted to tackle this guy.

"Sneakiness…" Mo hissed, "You were always known for your sneakiness, weren't you? Going behind my back, telling Tami I was sleeping with Billie Dean Elizabeth."

"Her name was Mary Ellen," Eric said.

"I almost forgot about Mary Ellen," Mo said. "She was fun in the sack. Not as fun as Tami though."

Eric's chair scraped back. Coach Compton reached out and put a forceful arm across his chest before he could stand up.

"Well, _Morris_ ," Coach Compton said. "It was lovely meeting you, but we all have families to get home to." He stood up. "Eric," he said, "Mick, let's go. I'm sure Morris here will be happy to cover our bill, seeing as he's such a successful investor."

On their way out of the bar, Eric threw Mo's business card in the trash. If Tami found it, she'd ask about it, and then she'd ask where he'd run into Mo, and then he'd be in trouble for his night out.

When Eric got home, Shelley was sitting on the couch with a bowl of popcorn in her lap. "Do you have any blank tapes?" she asked. "I want to record something later." She pointed to a tape on the end table. "Okay if I use this one?"

He snatched the tape up and cradled it to his chest. "No! That's game tape!"

"Wow. Chill out, Eric."

"I'll get you a blank tape." He pulled out the drawer in the end table, grabbed an unused tape, and handed it to her. "Tami asleep?"

"Yep." Shelley put her hand in the popcorn bowl and continued to watch the TV.

"Baby asleep?"

"You don't hear her screaming, do you? Tami took her in to bed to feed her a half hour ago. I think they both fell asleep in there."

With Tami having to breastfeed the baby, what exactly was Shelley's role here anyway? "When are you heading back to Dallas?" Shelley had finished her associate's degree in education in December, and she'd had a job at a preschool, but it had let out for the summer already, ahead of the regular schools, so she wasn't working again until late August. She was also still living in her mother and stepfather's basement.

"When Tami doesn't need me anymore."

Need her for what? She'd changed a few diapers yesterday. Done some laundry. Made a grocery store run. Washed the dishes. Okay, _maybe_ she was helping a little.

"You want to sit down and watch Beverley Hills 90210 with me?" Shelley asked him. "It might prepare you for coaching high school, if you ever move up."

He glanced at the television. "It's about football?"

"No, but it's about high school."

"Is that on right now?" he asked. "You didn't _record_ that, did you? You didn't use one of my tapes, did you?"

"Relax. I recorded it in Dallas and brought it with me. Don't worry. I would never record over one of your _precious_ game tapes."

"Good night," he said, and disappeared down the hall.

Tami was passed out cold, Julie snoozing at her bare breast.

"I love you," he whispered and kissed his baby's bald little head.

Julie woke up wailing.

 **[*]**

Two days later, Shelley got an offer to teach a summer preschool day camp, and off she went back home to Dallas. The new parents had two days alone with the baby before James and Betty Taylor arrived.

"At least they have the decency to stay in a hotel," Eric said.

One evening, Julie began one of her colic episodes in the midst of a family dinner around the cramped kitchen table. While Tami tried to comfort the infant, Eric dug his hand in his hair and said to his father, "This is what it's like. Every night."

"Well, son, it always gets worse before it gets better." Mr. Taylor stood up from the table, strode forward, and insisted, "Give her here. Give me my granddaughter."

Tami surrendered the baby, and Mr. Taylor supported Julie's neck while bouncing with her. She immediately fell silent. "That's my grandbaby," Mr. Taylor murmured. "That's my girl."

When Eric started clearing the plates to the sink, Tami came over to him and whispered, "Who is that man your mother brought with her?"

Eric shrugged and said, "I have no idea. I've never met him before."


	22. Chapter 22

**Chapter 22**

When his parents left, Eric counted down the days until he and Tami could start having sex again. It had been so long. He'd read both of the sex chapters in her pregnancy books: _Sex During Pregnancy_ and _Sex After Pregnancy_. He knew all about the four week mark, but when he brought it up to Tami, she told him the doctor said six weeks. So he bit his tongue and waited. When Tami finally agreed to fool around, she didn't seem _that_ into it. The first time back was vaguely disappointing.

Things were hard at home that summer. Eric kept busy by working as a counselor at a summer day camp for elementary school kids followed by summer training for the Yellow Snakes and teacher in-services. He counted the days between sex, which sometimes reached as many as seven. Even when they did have sex, it wasn't as good as it used to be. Sometimes it felt to Eric as if Tami was just fulfilling a chore, and then she'd go to sleep right after. Her breasts were practically off limits to him, now more tools than toys, and the baby always came first. He could be telling her about some important thing at summer training and she'd just walk away in mid-sentence to tend the infant.

 **[September]**

Eric felt unwanted by the time the school year started. There was a fellow history teacher, a pretty, twenty-five-year-old woman, who started sitting next to him at department meetings and talking to him in the teacher's lounge and asking about all the things he wished Tami would ask him about when he came home.

One day he was laughing with her in the lounge and pouring himself a cup of coffee during his lunch break when the head coach came in. "Coach Taylor," he said. "I need you in my office. Now."

Eric nodded goodbye to her and made his way past the gym to his boss's office. Coach Compton closed the door and the blinds. Eric sat across the desk from him.

Coach Compton stretched out his hand. "Give me that cap," he said.

Confused, Eric reached up for his golden brown Yellow Snakes coaching cap and handed it across the desk to Coach Compton. Coach Compton turned it over in his hands a couple of times and then suddenly smacked Eric in the face with it. "Wake up, son. What's wrong with you? You are courting temptation! "

"Excuse me?" said Eric, rubbing his cheek and looking wide-eyed at his boss.

"You have a fine woman at home, Eric." Coach Compton had met Tami three or four times in the past year. "A beautiful, intelligent woman who put you through college."

"Well…I put her through college first, I – "

"- who put you through college, who moved with you for your first job, and who has encouraged you to follow your calling. And yet every single day I see you in that teacher's lounge flirting with Ms. Kim Anderson."

"I wasn't flirting with her," he insisted. "I was being friendly."

"Eric, you're not a friendly sort of guy. You're polite. You're respectful. But you're not _friendly_."

"I was just being polite."

"You were courting temptation is what you were doing."

"I would _never_ cheat on Tami. I'm not that kind of man."

Coach Compton put his hand on the cap he'd used to assault Eric, pressed it against the desk, and leaned slightly forward. "I said _never_ too, years ago. Then the baby was born. I felt…like I'd been set aside. And there was this woman…a woman like Ms. Anderson…who made me feel like I was important again. _Never_ became _possibly_. _Possibly_ became _probably_. And _probably_ became _yes_."

"But…you're still married." Eric and Tami had shared dinner with his boss and his wife. They seemed to get along well. They had three children now, two in high school, and one just out of college.

"She forgave me eventually. But it was a rough three years after that, and I nearly lost everything. And I wounded her. The pain I inflicted on her, Eric…it's unimaginable. She forgave me, and I worked hard to be a better husband, and I _have_ been a good husband for many years now, but there's a part of her that's never going to fully heal."

Eric was uncomfortable with Coach Compton's personal confession. He shifted in his chair.

"She loves me," Coach Compton continued, "but she's never felt _quite_ the same way about me again. And all for…" He shook his head. "Listen, this is the hardest time your marriage is ever going to go through. Well…this and the toddler years. And the teenage years. But now…it's just so easy to drift apart – Tami's moving in her sphere with the baby, you're moving in yours, you don't either of you get enough sleep…there's not much sex."

Eric looked down at the desk.

"And you come to school, and there's a pretty lady who isn't home all day with a spitting-up baby, who's all put together and dressed for work and hasn't been up half the night...a woman who only shows you her _best_ side…a woman you don't have a few years of marriage baggage with. And you start to make the mistake of making comparisons that aren't realistic, that don't take the big picture into account. That's how it _starts_. I'm only telling you this, Eric, because I don't want you to screw up the same way I did. You think you're too strong to ever fall. Well, son, you're not."

"I…." Eric scratched his head. He felt like a kid who'd been caught stealing from the cookie jar.

"Strengthen your defense, son. Stop flirting with that woman. Stop trying to find her in the teacher's lounge. Just stop. Completely." Coach Compton slid Eric's cap across the desk. "You've got your free period next, and then you've got what, one more history class?"

"Yes, sir."

"I'll cover it for you. I taught history fifteen years back. I'll clear it with Principal Thomas. You go on home early now. You go on home to your wife."

Eric picked up his cap and headed for the door.

 **[*]**

On his way home, Eric pulled over to the shoulder because some guy was selling roses out of the back of his pick-up. They were only $10 a dozen. He didn't ask questions. He saw this a lot around San Antonio. Sometimes they were selling onions, sometimes roses, sometimes cigars.

When Eric got home, Tami had a wailing Julie in her arms. He'd thought this phase had ended over a month ago, but maybe Tami went through it more than he realized. He put the roses in a vase, told her he'd take over, and sent her to sleep.

Eric bounced Julie around, the way his father had taught him to do. It was quite the workout after a while, but she settled down. He put her in her swing, turned it on, and then straightened up the living room, which had some scattered clothes and baby toys and books and bottles that he washed and set out to dry.

When Tami yawned her way out two hours later, Julie was just stirring and ready to eat. Tami fed her unabashedly, and Eric tried not to be aroused by those full breasts on display.

"Wow, you really cleaned up," she said, glancing around the living room. She walked over to the entertainment center and sniffed the roses he'd set on top. "Thank you. They're really pretty." She went and sat down on the couch. "Why are you home so early?"

He sat beside her. "Coach Compton cut me loose."

"You lost your job?" she gasped. "Why? You were doing so well there!"

"No, no. Just for the day."

She smiled with relief. She really was beautiful, even when she was drained. He leaned in and kissed her. Then he kissed Julie's head. When Julie fell asleep, Tami lowered her into the pack n' play they always left in the living room. "I'd really love to take this chance for a shower," she said.

"Okay."

When she was half way down the hall, she turned back. "Aren't you going to join me?"

It was best sex they'd had in months, there against the shower wall. When they got out, Julie was still asleep. Tami cuddled up against Eric on the couch.

"I'm sorry," he said, "that I haven't been more help around here. I'm going to be more help."

"I'm sorry I've been so irritable. And I'm sorry…I haven't been much in the mood. We really need to reconnect. Don't we?"

"How 'bout I invite my parents down for a few days? They'll help with Julie. Maybe we can even get out on a date. You know how good my dad was with the baby. They both still have a few vacation days left."

 **[*]**

The next day, Eric did not go to the teacher's lounge. He ate lunch in Coach Compton's office, while they reviewed game tape. Kim Anderson popped into his classroom before his last history class of the day and said, "I haven't seen you all day, Eric."

"Yeah," he said. "I'm trying to get all my papers graded during the day now so I have more time to spend with my wife. I'm lucky to have her."

"Oh," the pretty history teacher said. "Well, if you ever want to compare notes, you know where to find me."

He never did try to find her.


	23. Chapter 23

**Chapter 23**

 **[October]**

James and Betty Taylor drove the five hours from Odessa to San Antonio and checked into a nearby hotel. They were a great help with Julie. One evening, while grandma and grandpa stayed in the apartment with the baby, Eric took Tami out for a nice dinner. They talked for a good two hours, and afterwards they parked in a far darkened corner of the junior high school parking lot and made out like teenagers.

When they got home, Julie was asleep in her crib, Betty Taylor had cleaned the entire kitchen, and Mr. Taylor had fixed the leaky faucet on the kitchen sink. Eric's parents left promptly for their hotel, promising to return the next morning to help Tami. "And of course we'll be at your game," Mr. Taylor said.

Eric and Tami went straight to their bedroom. Julie mercifully waited until five minutes after they had finished making love to wake up for her first feeding of the night. When the baby was settled back in the crib, and Tami was settled against Eric's chest in bed, he said, "I wish my dad wouldn't come to the game tomorrow."

"Why? He always came to your games when you were growing up."

"I know, and every time I looked over at the stands at him, I could see it - that thick cloud of disappointment just hovering over him. I _never_ lived up to his expectations for me."

"Did he say that?"

"He didn't _have_ to say it. I could _see_ the cloud."

"Well, I used to sit by him in the stands our junior year of high school, before we were dating, and he used to brag to the boosters about you."

"My dad doesn't brag. Not even about himself. Certainly not about me."

"Fine, honey, if you're determined to have daddy issues, you go on ahead and knock yourself out."

"You don't know. You didn't have him frown at you because you came home with a B+ instead of an A. You didn't have him wake you up at 6 AM on a Saturday morning to do football drills. And besides, you have mommy issues." He didn't dare mention her father, whom she hadn't spoken to in years.

"Because my mother's a religious nut," she said. "Or at least she was. I don't know what she's doing with that new husband of hers. For all I know she's worshiping Mary now."

"Catholics don't _worship_ Mary. And I never really saw that – her being a religious nut."

"You didn't have her measure the distance between your skirt and your knee before you went to school, or tell you that you were going to burn in hell if you so much as looked at a guy."

Eric peered down at her. "Is that _really_ what she said?"

"Not in _those_ words exactly, but yes." She raised her head to look at him. "We'll be better parents than our parents, won't we?"

"We'll sure as hell try."

 **[*]**

A five-month-old Julie spent most of the game in her grandfather's arms or sitting on his lap, where she gurgled and toyed with the AFL championship ring on his finger, occasionally trying to bring it to her mouth.

The Yellow Snakes lost, and when Eric met his family outside the locker room later, Julie was half asleep against Mr. Taylor's shoulder.

"Son," Mr. Taylor said, "y'all really should have used the Wing-T."

Betty Taylor poked her husband in the ribs.

"I mean, good game. Very close." Mr. Taylor looked at Julie, who had just turned her head toward his voice. "Don't you think so, Princess? Your daddy's a fine coach." Then he glanced at his wife, and Betty Taylor tightly smiled her half-approval.

 **[*]**

As Tami and Eric were saying goodbye to his parents and walking them out the front door of their apartment the next day, Mr. Taylor paused on the cement stoop a foot from the stairs that led down to the parking lot. He reached into his overcoat and handed Tami a card. "A belated baby shower gift," he said.

Eric stood in the open doorway, holding Julie, and watching as Tami opened the card. A check fell out. Tami scooped it up and saw the amount - $5,000. "Wow!" she exclaimed.

"I got offered a new job as the Athletic Director at El Paso University starting in January," Mr. Taylor said. "It pays handsomely. Betty intends to continue working full-time. With no kids at home…well, we don't really need all that money."

Tami showed Eric the check, and he raised an eyebrow.

"We know you're saving for a down payment on a house," said Betty Taylor as she dug the car keys out of her purse.

"But use a _tiny_ bit of it for the christening gown," Mr. Taylor said.

Tami was tucking the card and check back into the envelope. She stopped halfway and looked up at her father-in-law. "We are so thankful, James, we really are. But, you know…we've been going to this nondenominational church. They don't do infant baptism."

"Well, you have to get the baby baptized," Betty Taylor said.

Tami blinked. She might have expected this from her father-in-law, but not her mother-in-law. She could usually count on Betty Taylor to come to her defense.

"I'm sure we can find a priest who's willing," Mr. Taylor said.

"You can even come to Odessa and do it in our church," Betty Taylor said.

Tami looked at Eric for defense, but he just said, "We'll figure something out," handed Tami the baby, and then walked his parents to their car.

Later that night, when Julie was asleep, and they were preparing for bed, Tami confronted him about it.

"I don't like taking money from my father," Eric said, "but the truth is, we need it if we're ever getting out of this apartment. Besides, I don't mind getting Julie baptized."

"Well I do."

"What's the big deal?" he said as he stripped off his socks. "We take her to Odessa, we get her baptized, we have a little party, my mom's happy, my dad's happy."

"I don't like them thinking they can march in here writing checks and telling us how to make spiritual decisions about _our_ daughter! It's not what _our_ church does."

He sighed and dropped his pants. "The church _you_ picked."

"What? You said you _liked_ the church."

He crawled under the covers in his boxers and undershirt. "No, I said we could _go_ to the church."

She was already in her sweats, and she crawled in next to him. "You don't like it?"

"I don't care, Tami. If you're happy there, I don't care, but it's a little casual."

"Casual?"

"You know, _casual_."

"No, I _don't_ know. Talk to me, Eric. What don't you like about our church?"

"Well…there's not really any liturgy. When people pray, they're just making it up off the top of their heads. And those prayers go on forever sometimes. The sermon is like…half an hour long. At least. They only have communion once a month, and it's in these little plastic shot glasses, and it tastes like grape juice."

"Because it _is_ grape juice."

He adjusted his pillow and leaned back against the wall. "No one ever kneels when they pray. They clap while they're singing sometimes. And the hymns are so contemporary. They're not even hymns. They're like…really bad pop songs. And what's with the guitars and the drums? What's wrong with an organ? And when they pass the peace, people just mill all over the place, in and out of the chairs – they don't even have pews! – just walking up and down the chairs, chattering at each other. There's no symbols anywhere hardly. There's just that _one_ cross. No robes. No stained glass windows. No candles. No real altar to speak of. No images. No colors. People wear jeans, Tami. They wear _jeans_ to _church_. They – " He stopped suddenly. "Sorry," he muttered.

"Why didn't you tell me this before? Why didn't you tell me you didn't like it?"

"Because you do. And you seem….you know…you like it there. I'm happy to do whatever you want."

"You don't _sound_ happy."

"I just want to get Julie baptized in a Catholic church. To shut up my parents. That's all. It's not asking that much, is it? We can keep going to the happy clappy church you like. She can always get re-baptized at another church as an adult if that's her thing. If she wants to do that. If she feels like the first one didn't _count_."

"Fine! Fine. Just tell me when to show up for this christening." She slid down under the blanket and rolled her back to him.

"Well, it'll have to be after football season."

She lay there stewing for a couple of minutes, but then she began to think. Eventually, she rolled to Eric, who was still awake and staring up at the ceiling. "Hon, why don't we start trying other churches until we find one we _both_ like? I don't want to go Catholic, but it doesn't _have_ to be nondenominational. We can try something in between. Something more…traditional."

"Tami, if you're happy – "

"- I'm mostly happy with that Bible Study I'm in. We don't really study. We talk about being new moms. I can keep going to that, even if we go to a different church."

He scooted down, turned on his side, and kissed her. "Thanks," he whispered.

"You know, all you had to do was _talk_ to me. You need to tell me things. What you're thinking. What you're feeling. What you want."

He smiled. "I want a blow job."

She rolled her eyes. "Julie's going to be up in three hours." She reached for the light. "Good night."


	24. Chapter 24

**Chapter 24**

 **[November]**

Tami leaned against her husband on the couch. Eric was enjoying a post-game glass of scotch. Coach Compton had introduced him to the drink and given him a bottle to take home, and now it was his ritual every time he returned from a game. Tami was savoring a glass of wine. She'd half weaned Julie to formula. Tami had decided six months of exclusive breast feeding was enough for her, baby books be damned.

Tami knew her husband was hoping to get laid tonight. He'd started angling for it as soon as he got home. He'd been throwing ridiculous compliments at her like rice at a wedding, even though her hair was rumpled and she was wearing baggy sweats and her face was worn from lack of sleep. Julie _still_ didn't really sleep through the night. Julie had smiled early. She'd laughed early. She'd rolled over early. She'd even sat up early. But that one milestone of sleeping through the night seemed to have inexplicably eluded her.

Tami was starting to doze off against Eric when the phone rang.

"It's after ten," Eric muttered. "Don't answer it."

Yep. He was still hoping to get laid. He was a pessimist in some things, a realist in others, but when it came to sex, he was an eternal optimist. She slipped out from under his arm and went to answer the kitchen phone.

When she came back and sat down, she was in a daze.

"Babe?" he said, setting his glass on the coffee table and putting a hand on her shoulder. "You a'ight?"

"That was my mom. My dad…he died."

"Oh, babe…" He wrapped his arms around her. "I'm so sorry."

"I haven't seen or talked to him in years. I don't know why it should upset me."

He kissed the top of her head. "Of course it upsets you."

She nestled her head under his chin and cried quietly for a while. Then she raised her head and wiped her eyes. "Cirrhosis of the liver," she said. "At only forty-five. Can't say I'm surprised, though."

She looked at his empty scotch glass on the table and then to her own wine glass.

"I'm not your father," he said. "I don't drink too much. And neither do you."

"I know," she said. "But promise me, if I ever do, you'll tell me? If it ever becomes excessive, you'll make me stop? And vice versa - if I ever tell you I think it's time to stop - you will?"

"I promise." He held her close.

She cried softly. When she asked for tissues, he brought them to her. After she was done wiping her nose, she stared at the balled up Kleenex and said, "You know what really bothers me? I'm not really sad that he's dead. I'm sad we never had a _real_ relationship. I mean…not that I ever thought we would, that he'd have some late in life conversion or anything, but…somehow…that possibility being _officially_ off the table…" She shrugged.

"I know," he whispered. "When's the funeral? Do you want to go?"

"Sunday. In Kentucky. That's where his family was from originally, and where he ended up I guess. I'd like to go, just for the closure. But I don't want to go alone."

"I'll go with you of course."

"You have that meeting Sunday afternoon, don't you?"

"I'll reschedule it," he said.

"You have to be at practice early Monday morning. We wouldn't be back by then."

"Coach Compton can run it himself. It's just one practice."

"What about Julie? I don't want to bring a baby to a funeral. And I don't want her flying yet."

"I'll call my parents tonight. I'm sure at least one of them can come and watch her."

"Flights are going to be _so_ expensive last minute like this," she warned him.

He kissed her forehead. "Well, that's what savings is for," he said softly.

"Really?" Eric was desperate to get them into a house closer to his school. The apartment was always having problems – a single toilet that backed up once a week, no hookup for a dishwasher (so everything had to be hand washed), ants that occasionally came out in hordes, and a landlord who was slow to respond to any of it. Eric had refused to touch that growing house savings for _anything_ else. She kissed him and whispered, "Thank you."

"I love you, Tami. I love you, and I'm here."

 **[*]**

The next morning, Tami called Shelley to see if she was coming to the funeral. She knew her mother wasn't, but Shelley might.

"Why would I?" Shelley asked. "I've got a dad right here in Dallas."

"You mean…Antonio?" Tami had never heard Shelley call Antonio _dad_ before. It was bizarre to her. Shelley had already been in high school when their mother had remarried, after all.

"He was at my drill team competition my junior year. He vetted my dates for junior and senior prom. He was at my high school graduation. He paid for my associate's degree. He's far more my dad than _that_ asshole ever was."

"Yeah…okay. I get that. But, don't you want closure?"

"Tami, I closed that door when I was six years old."

 **[*]**

Tami had to explain to everyone at the funeral who she was. She met an aunt and uncle she hadn't seen in nineteen years and several first cousins. She also learned that her father had been sober for two years before he died, too late to save his liver from the damage he'd inflicted with years of seriously heavy drinking.

And then she'd met her half-brother.

"I have a baby brother," Tami said for the third time as they lay in the hotel bed Sunday night.

"Yep," Eric replied for the third time.

"He's only six months older than my own daughter!"

"Yep."

"Maybe he's not even the only one. Maybe my dad's had kids with six different women."

"Seems unlikely," Eric said.

"Did she seem stable to you, the mother? She seemed surprisingly stable to me."

"I think she'll do a'ight by the boy. I don't think you have to worry."

"Do you think my mom knew and didn't tell us?"

"I can't imagine – "

"- I bet she knew and didn't tell us, because she knew I'd try to get in touch with my dad so I could meet my brother. "

"Tami, I think the only reason your mom even learned your father was dead was because he left her his wedding ring in his will."

Tami couldn't believe he hadn't pawned that ring, that he'd kept it all those years. "Why do you think he didn't try to get in touch with me after he finally sobered up?"

"Maybe he did. Maybe he couldn't. Your mom moved to Dallas four years ago. It was the lawyer for the estate that found her."

 _The estate_. She almost laughed. Her father had died with a wedding ring and net worth of $3,500. Still, he'd had that wedding ring for some reason. He'd finally sobered up for some reason. "Do you think my dad had regrets? That he - " She choked and started crying.

He turned on his side and held her. "I really wish I knew the right thing to say right now, Tami. I wish I could take all of your pain on me."

She half laughed through her tears. "Honey, that _is_ the right thing to say."


	25. Chapter 25

**Chapter 25**

 **[December]**

When Eric and Tami drove to Odessa for the christening, Julie was already seven months old. It had been a challenge to find a christening gown for a baby that size.

Shelley came, as did Tami's mother, but the new husband was away on business. "His name is Antonio," Shelley told Tami. "They've been married four years now. Stop calling him the new husband."

Shelley had recently quit her preschool job over an altercation with the preschool director regarding educational theory.

"What?" Eric asked. "Shelley has opinions about educational theory?"

Tami replied, "Eric, Shelley has opinions about everything."

Tami's little sister was now teaching aerobics and dating some guy Eric's age. Shelley was only in junior high when Tami and Eric started dating, so how could she now be with someone Eric's age? How did time do things like that?

Grady and Angie came and stood up as Julie's godparents, even though Eric and Tami had only seen them twice since moving to San Antonio. All but one of Eric's cousins were at the baptismal party, and, boyfriend notwithstanding, Shelley flirted shamelessly with all of them, but especially Philip Andrew.

"Your sister's something else," Philip Andrew told Tami. He looked across the Taylors' expansive kitchen to Shelley, who was in the breakfast nook, eating powdered cookies and licking the powder off her fingers. "Something else," he muttered, and disappeared beyond the kitchen into the house.

"Is my sister giving your brother a hard time?" Tami asked John Paul, who had been leaning against the counter beside her. John Paul had graduated from UT as a theatre major, and he was now doing improv in the evenings while working construction during the day. They'd gone to see one of his shows in Austin right after Eric graduated, but they hadn't had a chance to go back since the pregnancy.

John Paul laughed. "Oh, you don't know the half of it. Philip's a postulant now."

"What?"

"It's like pledging a fraternity, only…it's a monastery."

"I thought he might go to seminary after college," she said. "But I didn't see a monastery coming."

"When he goes back, he'll be a novice. If he can't survive Shelley, he won't survive his novice year. But I suspect he will. Then he'll take temporary vows. Then he'll eventually take his solemn vows of poverty, obedience, and _chastity_. Someone should really tell Shelley about the chastity thing."

Tami shook her head. "It's not healthy to try to suppress your sexual urges like that."

"Why not?"

Tami laughed. John Paul was on his ninth girlfriend since she had met him.

"Hey," he said, "didn't you expect Eric to suppress his urges when you first started dating? I'm sure he _wanted_ to have sex with you before he actually _did_."

"Well, yes, but I didn't expect him to suppress them for his _entire life_."

John Paul shrugged. "To each his own. Philip knows who he is and what he wants." He raised his punch across the room toward Eric, who had just come in through the kitchen door from the patio. "You keeping my cousin in line? Is he behaving himself?"

"Most of the time," Tami said with a smile.

Eric strolled across the kitchen toward them. "You flirting with my wife again?" he asked.

"Someone has to," John Paul said. "You've been out there grilling for an hour."

Eric looked around the kitchen. "Where's Julie?"

Tami shrugged. "Someone responsible has her I'm sure. Probably your father."

"As long as it's not Nathan Gregory," John Paul said. "He'll stuff her with cake until she vomits, if he doesn't fracture her skull tossing her toward the ceiling."

"I better go look for her." Tami anxiously disappeared from the kitchen.

Eric smirked. "Well played. Let's sneak upstairs and watch football. My dad finally got cable."

"Yeah. Your pal Grady is already up there. Tell Philip to get us some beer."

 **[*]**

Tami had reclaimed Julie and now sat next to Angie on the living room couch. Julie sat on her lap and played with a ring of large, plastic keys. Everyone else was either in the kitchen, on the patio, or upstairs watching football. The only other inhabitant of the living room was Eric's youngest cousin Maggie, who lay on the floor playing with her Barbie dolls. The seventh of seven children, she was erratically doted on by her older brothers, but largely left to her own devices by her parents.

"So," Angie asked, "How are things since you had the baby? How is…" She half whispered. "S-E-X?"

"What's sex?" Maggie asked.

Tami giggled. "She's in first grade. She can spell. And it's O-K. Sometimes _great_. Sometimes…" Tami shrugged.

"I'm only asking because…" Angie put a hand over her stomach.

Tami squealed. "When's it due?"

"June."

"That's great! We can come visit you guys after she's born. Or he. Eric has about three weeks in July when he doesn't work. I mean…when he doesn't have to _be_ anywhere. He _always_ works."

 **[*]**

"Damn ref," Eric muttered.

"I would not have made that call," Grady agreed.

Philip Andrew sat down next to John Paul on the 5-seat, L- shaped couch and set a one-gallon growler on the coffee table. He began unstacking four plastic cups and then pouring.

"Is this more of your bathtub beer?" Grady asked.

"No, this is better," Philip said. "It's from the monastery. I'm apprenticed to the master brewer." He began passing the cups down.

"My brother has found his true calling," John Paul said as he sipped the brew.

Philip sat back with his cup. "Your dad has quite the entertainment suite."

"Well he didn't have seven kids to support," Eric replied. "Although I don't know why he waited until I was _out_ of the house to get a decent television and cable."

"Well," John Paul mused, "my dad says your dad is tighter than a virgin on – "

Philip Andrew interrupted him: "Let's not repeat that expression."

"But," John Paul continued, "My dad also said your dad's going to be making a shitload next month when he starts that Athletic Director job at El Paso University." There had been a SOLD sign up outside the Odessa house when they arrived. The moving trucks were rolling in next week.

When John Paul told him how much Mr. Taylor would be earning, Eric lowered his cup. " _What?_ That's almost as much as some college QB coaches make."

John Paul pointed his beer cup at Eric. "Then you should aim to coach college ball."

"Yeah…well…I'm just aiming to get out of junior high right now."

"What color are we rooting for?" Philip asked.

"Green," Eric said while John Paul answered, "Red."

"That's actually burgundy," Eric insisted. "And how can you possibly live in Texas and be a Red Skins fan?"

"I do it just to piss off my dad."

Shelley popped into the room and took the last seat next to Philip Andrew. All four guys looked down the couch at her.

"I teach aerobics," she told Philip. "It's very challenging but it helps me to stay in excellent shape."

Grady chuckled. John Paul looked her up and down. "I'll say." Eric glared at him, and John Paul whispered, "Hey, I'm just trying to take one for the team."

Shelley put an arm on the back of the couch behind Philip and turned to face him. "What do you do to stay in such good shape?"

John Paul smirked. "He gardens."

Philip stood up. "I'm going to go see if my Aunt Betty needs any help in the kitchen."


	26. Chapter 26

**Chapter 26**

 **[January]**

When the landlord raised the rent and a crack mysteriously appeared in the master bedroom wall, Eric and Tami decided it was time to take the plunge, break their lease, and buy a house.

Tami had a blast house hunting. She scoured the newspaper for listings every morning and e-mailed realtors in the evening. Every night, while Eric was grading papers in the living room, the dial-up modem would beep and whine its way online as Tami logged on to her AOL account from the corner desk in the cluttered living room.

"Why don't you just call them?" Eric asked. "Don't we have to pay an hourly fee for that AWOL thing?"

"Because it's late," she said. "And this is more fun. I'm leaving my number." She typed away on the keyboard. "Plus, I have to e-mail my sister."

On Saturdays, Eric and Tami would tour houses, sometimes letting Julie down to crawl her way across the floor.

"This is a nice one," Eric told her as they stood in the master bedroom of one house. He was holding Julie at this point because she'd recently tried to lick an electrical outlet. The girl was fighting to get out of his arms, but he had a firm grasp. "And it's in our budget."

"Hon, it only has the half bath in the hallway. We need two _full_ baths."

"Why? We can all use the same shower."

"But I don't want guests showering in the master bath."

"We aren't buying a house for guests."

"And eventually, we're going to have a second child," she reminded him. They planned to have their kids four years apart.

"Well, this one has _three_ bedrooms. One for each kid, and one for us."

She smiled coquettishly and kissed his cheek. "But what about the one we looked at yesterday? It was _really_ nice. With the two _full_ baths and three bred rooms and that open study where you can do all your planning? It had a _garage_ too! That'll keep the car cooler in summer."

"This one has a shaded carport."

"But the other one has a _much_ bigger backyard. More room for you and Julie to toss the football when she gets older."

He sighed. "We could only manage to put ten percent down on that house."

"The realtor said we can get a loan with only ten percent down."

"Just because we can qualify for a loan doesn't mean we can afford it." He released Julie because she was struggling so hard, but he kept an eye on her. She crawled over and pulled herself up on the bed. She just stood there bouncing. "My dad says it used to be a lot harder to qualify for home loans and that there's going to be a lot of people who end up in over their heads."

"Your dad? Your dad's an athletic director. What does he know about real estate?"

"He reads finance books just for fun. He _knows_ stuff. He says we shouldn't take on a mortgage that' s more than two and a half times my annual income. This house is nice. It'll be good for us."

She hated that he wasn't even discussing it with her, that he didn't seem to care whether or not she even _liked_ the house they were standing in at this moment. "I don't _want_ this house." She scooped up Julie and walked down the hall.

When they were in the car and Eric was driving, she glanced at him. He was concentrating fiercely on the road, and his jaw was rigid. She looked in the rearview mirror at Julie and then back at Eric.

"I'm sorry I can't afford to give you the house you want," he said. "I'm sorry I'm not successful enough."

Now she understood she'd hurt rather than angered him. "That's not what this is about, Eric. That's not – "

"- You probably shouldn't have dumped Mo for me. I bet if you'd stuck with him, you'd have two houses by now."

"Sure," she said. "One for me and one for his mistress."

Eric's lips twitched into a half smile.

She put a hand on his knee. "What was behind that half bath? A storage closet, right?"

"Uh…yeah. I think so."

"You know, in a couple of years, when we have enough money, we could knock out that wall and expand the bathroom into a full bath. Right?"

"Sure."

"And I liked that little nook in the master bedroom," she said. "it's the perfect size for a little table and chair and a mirror. I could make that my vanity, sit and brush my hair at night."

He held the steering wheel with one hand and reached over to stroke her hair.

She smiled. "And you know, there were a lot of young kids playing outside in the street. I don't remember seeing any kids in the other neighbourhood."

He returned his hand to the wheel. "Listen, we don't have to get _that_ house if you don't like it. We can look at bunch of other ones. I just want to try to stay in budget."

"And I just want to find something that _feels_ right. Let's sit down tonight, go over all the finances _together_ , and agree on a maximum price. Then we'll keep looking." She leaned over and kissed his cheek. "You're a success, Eric. You're a fine teacher and a good coach, and I respect you."

 **[February]**

They found a one-story rambler with the two full baths Tami wanted but with a smaller master bedroom. "Happy Valentine's Day," he told her when they closed, and he insisted on carrying her over the threshold.

 **[March]**

Julie took her first steps when she was just ten months old. Eric was there for the momentous occasion. He'd been sitting on his knees on the living room floor, urging her to "Come to Daddy." She'd crawled a little at first, pulled herself up on the coffee table, and then walked – four big steps at once – before falling, laughing, into his arms.

 **[April]**

One afternoon, Eric came home from spring training and set a football down on the kitchen table. Julie toddled right on over, reached up, put her hand on it, and said, "Fooball."

"Tami!" Eric shouted. "Did you hear that?"

If Tami hadn't been standing a few feet away at the counter, she would have thought Eric was making it up.

Julie's second word was "Da-da" (or so Eric claimed), and her third was "mom." Not "mama" or even "mommy," but - "mom."

 **[May]**

Some eight dozen photographs were taken at Julie's first birthday party, most of them by Eric's parents. Now that they lived in El Paso, they were two hours further away from their granddaughter and didn't get to visit as often.

Grandpa Taylor gave Julie a noisy activity table, a large, plastic Tot Tunes CD player, and a ball pit tent with 100 plastic multi-colored balls.

"Where the hell are we going to put that tent?" Eric grumbled when his parents left.

 **[July]**

That summer, Eric and Tami spent three days in Houston at Angie and Grady's house. Their new baby was a cute, plump little boy by the name of Michael. Eric approved the choice, since it was his own middle name.

Tami would have stayed longer, but Eric refused to "impose" on Angie and Grady, even though they'd invited the Taylors to stay longer and their house had four bedrooms. "Fish and guests, Tami," Eric said. "Fish and guests."

Before they left Houston, they took a romantic tour of some of their old haunts, and Tami insisted on finding the tree beneath which he had proposed that first time. It was gone, however. The wooded short-cut from the corner to the dorms had been turned into a student parking lot.

"That's okay, babe," he reassured her. "We're still standing."

Julie toddled her way around the bookstore where Eric used to work, and they bought her a UH shirt and cap. They went to the MWU campus, too, and while Tami was gazing at those buildings where she used to enjoy learning, she said, "I might want to go back to school someday. Get a graduate degree."

Eric didn't say a word, but he didn't precisely appear thrilled by the suggestion.


	27. Chapter 27

**[About A Year Later]**

The next summer, Tami's mother moved to Lubbock for Antonio's job. "It'll be good for Shelley," Tami's mom told her, "if we live farther away. She'll have to get out of our basement. She'll have to spread her wings." Tami's mother was less pleased, however, when Shelley spread her wings simply by flying to her boyfriend's apartment in Plano. "I never thought a daughter of mine would end up living in sin," she said.

In July, Eric received a job offer as a QB coach for a high school in Dallas. "I love working with Coach Compton," he said, "but I can't pass this up. They'll only make me teach three history classes and a weightlifting class. I can concentrate more on football. And it's high school! 4A!"

Tami smiled to hear how excited he was, and she didn't mind the move, as it put her in a major city just thirty minutes from her sister. They did have to take on a slightly larger mortgage, however, because of the increased cost of living.

Tami played the cultured mom that summer, taking Julie to every museum she could find in Dallas and nearby Fort Worth. The little girl was only two, but she was alarmingly verbal for her age, so Tami had hoped she might enjoy the experience.

If there wasn't a button to push, however, Julie wasn't interested. The one exception was the art museum. Julie would sometimes stare at a painting for as long as sixty seconds before moving onto the next, issuing a verdict of "pwetty" or "weird" or asking an insightful question such as "What is it?" or "Why aw her boobies showing?" Once Julie asked, "Do awtists make a lot of money?"

"Artists? Not usually," Tami replied.

"Oh, then I'm mare-weeing a banker."

"You don't have to marry a banker. You can make your _own_ money, you know," Tami told her.

" _You_ don't."

That evening, Tami scoured the help wanted ads and began printing out resumes on their new desk jet printer.

Eric got home from his first day of school around 5:30. "What's for dinner?" he asked.

"I ordered pizza." At the moment, she was sitting at the kitchen table and collating and stapling the two-page resumes she'd printed. She could still see Julie from the kitchen. The girl currently lounged stomach-down on the living room couch, her face turned toward the television. Tami had been strict about restricting Julie's television viewing ("the book says TV can negatively affect their developing brains"), but ever since Julie had stopped napping, Tami had started bending the rule to maintain her own quiet time.

"What's with all the paper?" he asked, plucking up a sheet. "Volleyball team leader?" he asked. "I didn't know you were the team leader."

She'd put that under her "leadership skills" section. She'd only been on the team for one season. It had taken up too much time.

"Wait," he asked, "Are you applying for something?"

She sighed. "I think it's time for me to get back to work."

"But I thought you wanted to wait until Julie was in kindergarten. What are we going to do about childcare?"

"We could pay Shelley" Tami suggested. "She could probably use the money. Her aerobics classes are mostly on weekends and in the evenings. I could get a job near Plano. Drop Julie on my way."

"No offense… I know she's your sister and all…but I don't know if I want Shelley raising my daughter."

"She has an associate's degree in early childhood education."

"And she earned a 2.4, even though she was living with your mother and not working."

"She used to teach preschool, you know."

"For less than a year," he reminded her. "Then she _quit_ to teach _aerobics_. Part-time."

"She used to babysit in high school," Tami said." I know she's a little flaky, Eric, but it's not as if she's going to leave her niece in a car with the windows rolled up."

"Yeah, but…I just think you're a better influence on our daughter. You're intelligent, articulate, thoughtful, compassionate…" He lowered his voice, "beautiful…." He leaned down to kiss her.

"Are you angling for something, Coach?"

"Nah. Just being honest."

She looked at the resumes scattered across the table. "I just feel like I'm not really contributing."

Eric took off his black and white cap – Tami much preferred these colors to those of the Yellow Snakes (she preferred the name, too, the Jaguars) –hung it on the back of the chair, and sat down. "Why the hell would you say that?"

"I mean I'm not contributing anything to the household income."

"Sure you are. You take care of Julie, so we don't have to pay Shelley. You cook dinner, so we eat out less than some other people. You do the taxes, so we don't have to hire an accountant. You take the time to shop for the deals. Babe, you _make_ us money by _saving_ us money."

"I never thought of it that way."

He took her hand. "Your support makes it a lot easier for me to do my job, which means I'll get farther and make more money. This ship couldn't run without you, babe. We'd all just be floating around in one spot, getting nowhere."

"You really want to get laid tonight, don't you?"

"I really don't want Shelley raising our daughter."

She sighed, took her hand out of his, and began collecting the resumes into a pile.

"If you _want_ to get a job, Tami, that's one thing. But don't feel like you _have_ to. Don't feel like what you do here isn't important. Because it is. I appreciate it. I'm sorry if I don't say that enough."

She looked at the stack of papers. She didn't really want to go back to work, not yet, not when Julie wasn't even in preschool. "Well, I guess it was good to update my resume, at least. It'll be ready when Julie goes to Kindergarten."

Eric went to open a bottle of wine and sat back down at the table with her. He scooted his chair so they were at close corners with one another. He poured her a glass and then filled his own. "How was your day?" he asked.

"We went to the Meadows Museum. Julie wants to marry a banker instead of an artist."

"That's my girl. She's got a good head on her shoulders." He glanced back at where Julie had fallen asleep on the couch.

"And how was your first day of school?" Tami asked.

He turned back to her. "High school 's different. The players are more cocky. And teaching U.S. history to 10th graders is a hell of a lot different than teaching general history to 7th graders."

"How's that?"

"Well for starters, at the beginning of all of my classes, the girls just giggled for almost ten minutes. They kept looking at me and then whispering to each other and then giggling. I thought my fly must be undone, but it wasn't."

Tami laughed. "Oh, Eric."

"What?"

She kissed his cheek. "I love how innocent you can be sometimes. It's adorable."

"What are you talking about?"

"They were giggling because you're an attractive man. And they were whispering because they were sharing the fact with each other."

"Damn, Tami, I'm ten years older than those girls."

"Trust me, if you had been my history teacher…" She shook her head and laughed. "I'd be stopping in after every class and asking for extra help with my assignments."

"Yeah?" He smirked and leaned in to kiss her. "You want to earn a little extra credit tonight?"

 **[November]**

The Jaguars made it to the play-offs. Eric was busy. He hauled up in his office in the guest bedroom for hours. He stopped by his QB1's house to work with him in private. He got home later in the evening. Tonight, it was almost eight before he walked through the door. Tami had just finished reading to Julie in her toddler bed. Julie wasn't toddling anymore - but that's what they called the bed.

When Eric came in, he was holding a little, floppy armed, stuffed monkey. "For my baby girl," he said, setting it down on the bed. Julie snatched it up. Eric kissed Tami's head.

"Where'd you get that?" Tami asked.

"Some girls were selling them in school. Some fundraiser for field hockey or something."

"Odd choice of sales item," Tami said.

Julie stretched out the arms of the monkey. "Like a noodle!" she said, and laughed. "Monkey noodle!"

Eric bent to kiss her nose. " _You're_ my Monkey Noodle."

 **[*]**

When he crawled into bed next to Tami later that night, she yawned and rolled over and settled against him. There was so much tension in his body that she felt like she was cuddling up with a rock. "You need to relax," she told him. "You have to get some sleep for your game tomorrow."

He sighed. "I think I'm just going to end up getting up and watching some more game tape."

"You can't stay up all night, Eric." She kissed his shoulder through his t-shirt. "Let me help you relax."

An excited smile teased the corners of his mouth. "Yeah?"

She scooted up his t-shirt and bent to kiss his navel, just above his boxers. "Mhhmmm..." she murmured.

"But I still get my victory lay tomorrow too?" he asked. "If I win?"

She giggled and tucked a finger into the band at the side of his boxers. She peered up at him. "Even if you lose, sugar. I'm proud of you, you know."

He buried a hand in her thick hair. "Show me."

 **[*]**

When the door knob jiggled a few minutes later, Tami, who was on top of him, suddenly stilled. "Did you lock it when you came in?"

In answer to her question, the door flew open. In an instant, Tami yanked the blankets up to her shoulders. The hall light seeped in. "Why are you on top of Daddy?" Julie asked.

Tami rolled to the side and pulled the blanket all the way to just beneath her chin.

Eric was half panting. "What do you want?" he asked, the irritation in his voice causing Julie to step back.

"I had a bad dream."

He closed his eyes.

"Can I sleep with you?" Julie took a few steps toward the bed.

"No!" They both said at once.

"We mean, I'll put you back to bed and read you some stories," Tami said. She rustled under the blankets for the night shirt and underwear that had become lost somewhere near the foot of the bed and dressed underneath the covers. She kissed Eric's cheek before she slid out of bed.

When she came back twenty minutes later, Tami locked the door.


	28. Chapter 28

**[December]**

Football season had come to a close with a failed run for the 4A State Championships. For winter break, the Taylors went to El Paso to see Eric's parents. Shelley complained that they wouldn't be spending Christmas with her.

"We see you all the time," Eric said. "All. The. Time."

It was the first time they'd ever seen the El Paso house. They parked in the grand, circular brick driveway, and Eric kept looking at the little slip of paper he'd written the address on and looking at the numbers on the house and back at the paper. "Maybe I wrote the street down wrong."

Before them rose a two-story, villa style house, with a beautifully landscaped front yard consisting of a rock garden, a variety of cacti, and a flowing stone fountain. Jetting out from the second story was a covered balcony that overlooked the garden below.

"Gwandpa!" Julie shouted, and began unbuckling her car seat. She was too dexterous for her age, and that made her dangerous. She tried to get out of the car, but Tami had the child locks on.

Grandpa Taylor opened her door from the outside. "Princess! Do you know what we're doing today?"

"What! What!" Julie asked, climbing up into his arms. "Cwistmas tree?"

"Yes, my little one, we can string the tree. But we're also building a doll house!"

Grandpa Taylor carried her inside while Eric and Tami got the bags and followed. Betty Taylor gave them the grand tour, starting with a master bedroom that was the size of Eric and Tami's kitchen, breakfast nook, and living room combined. The master bath had two separate sinks, a shower, and a soaking tub. They followed her through the hardwood-floored formal dining room to a large kitchen with granite counter tops and a center-island stove. It opened onto the spacious living room, which had a gas fireplace. They went through the breakfast nook and outside onto the patio.

"Holy…" Eric muttered under his breath as he surveyed the outdoor kitchen, gazebo, pool, and hot tub.

"It's too cool for the pool, but you and Tami can use the hot tub tonight if you want," Betty Taylor said. "Share a bottle of wine. We'll keep an eye on Julie."

"We didn't bring suits," Tami said.

Betty shrugged. "We never use them. The neighbors can't see our yard from their house."

Eric flushed and winced at the same time.

Upstairs was a guest bedroom suite with its own full bathroom, another living room, a hall bathroom, and a large bedroom that had been converted into a study with built-in, floor-to-ceiling book cases.

"What the hell, Mom?" Eric asked. "When did Dad stop pinching pennies?"

"Eric, don't say hell to me."

"Yes, ma'am. Sorry."

"We're going to be fifty," Betty Taylor said. "It's time to really enjoy ourselves."

 **[*]**

That afternoon, Julie and her grandfather built a doll house together in his workshop. Well, Grandpa Taylor built it. Julie slathered it with paint, four different colors, and then glittered the roof.

When they came in from his workshop, Julie ran off to "help" her grandmother bake cookies while Eric threw on his jacket and disappeared to the outdoor kitchen to start the grill.

Tami's father-in-law sat next to her on the living room couch and said, "My granddaughter is one smart cookie."

"I know."

"No, Tami, I mean _really_ smart. She's developmentally advanced for her age by nearly every rubric. What's your plan for her education?"

"My _plan_?" asked Tami, laughing. "Well, when she's about four, I _plan_ to put her in a pre-K program a few mornings a week. And then I _plan_ to enroll her in kindergarten when she's about five."

"Public kindergarten?"

"Sure. It was good enough for me. It was good enough for your son."

Mr. Taylor shook his head. "It was a different time," he said. "If you want to send her to a private school for the gifted, I'll pay her tuition. It's cheap to live here. I'm making a very good salary at El Paso University. Betty's making a decent income too. We don't need all that."

"James, she's not even quite three. And the public schools have gifted programs, if it turns out she needs one." _And I don't want to take any more of your money._

"The offer still stands if you ever change your mind."

 **[*]**

On Christmas Eve, Tami stayed in with Julie while Eric and his parents went out to a nice dinner followed by a candlelight, midnight mass. After four stories, Julie fell asleep on the inflatable mattress in the guest bedroom next to the bed Tami and Eric would share. She crept downstairs, poured herself a glass of wine, plugged in the Christmas tree, started the fire, and settled onto the couch to read, stretched out, her head propped up by pillows. She fell asleep within an hour.

She was awoken by the sound of her husband cursing. "Jesus Christ!"

"Don't use the Lord's name in vain," Mr. Taylor scolded him.

Her eyelids fluttered open, and she saw them there, sitting by the Christmas tree, attempting to assemble what looked like a tricycle.

"Well Santa needs a beer," Eric said.

"We don't have beer," James said. "Your mother only drinks wine. It looks like your wife opened a bottle." He motioned with a screwdriver toward the kitchen.

Eric went and poured himself a glass.

Tami closed her eyes again. Maybe Eric would be a gentleman and carry her up later. She listened to them assemble, mutter, and talk.

"Jesus, Dad, how many presents did you get Julie? I don't want you to spoil her."

"Don't use the Lord's name in vain. Is that what they teach you to do at that nondenominational church?"

"We're going to a Methodist church now." The church was Protestant enough for Tami and had almost enough tradition to satisfy Eric. He still wasn't fond of the grape juice, however. "And, seriously, there must be over a dozen gifts under there."

"Santa has resources, Eric."

"Well, Santa never brought _me_ more than _four_ gifts."

"Poor baby. Were you deprived, son? With a roof over your head and three meals a day and warm clothes in the winter?"

"You made me work to buy everything extra. If I wanted brand name jeans instead of the cheap jeans, I had to pay the difference. If I wanted a Walkman, I had to buy it. If I wanted a car, I had to buy it."

"Don't whine because I taught you industry and self-reliance, son."

"Well, maybe I want to teach Julie those things too."

"Julie's two and a half. And she's my granddaughter. Now hand me that screw."

 **[*]**

Julie tore laughing through the presents the next morning. She emptied her stocking full of beanie babies and age-inappropriate candy. She tried on her two princess costumes. She whirled on her sit-n-spin until she almost threw up. She fed her crying and peeing baby doll. She opened her artist's kit and spread the markers and colored pencils all across the floor. She took out all the pieces to Candy Land and left them on the kitchen table. She took out the adoption certificate for her Cabbage Patch doll and put it inside one of the six volumes of her hardback Dr. Seuss collection. She rode her tricycle around the circular brick driveway a dozen times.

As the four adults stood outside and watched Julie pedal and push, Eric asked his father, "How are we supposed to get all of this stuff home?"

"Well why did you bring the car? Why didn't you bring the pick-up?"

"The car gets better mileage."

"Guess we'll just have to bring some of it up when we visit you in January."

Tami raised an eyebrow. Eric had not pre-approved a January visit with her.

That night, Julie crashed at 7:30. Eric's parents turned in at 9. Tami looked out the downstairs living room window and suggested heating up the hot tub and enjoying some wine while they soaked.

"Hell no," Eric said. "I'm not sitting in some hot tub my parents have entered naked."

"I'm sure they _clean_ it, Eric."

"No. Hell no. We can go take a shower together if you want."

"How do you know your parents haven't had sex in that shower? Maybe they've christened every inch of this house."

"Stop. Just. Stop."

 **[*]**

They got back to Dallas on December 28th. That night, as Eric and Tami were cozying up in bed, little kisses turned into deep kisses, caresses turned into petting, and clothes came off. Eric stretched his arm behind himself and fumbled to open the drawer in the nightstand where he kept the condoms.

After Julie was born, Tami didn't go back on the pill. She was breastfeeding to start, and then she worried about the pill making her gain weight right when she was trying to lose it. Besides, they'd discussed having a second child eventually, so she thought they'd just use condoms in the meantime.

"You don't really need that, do you?" she asked.

His hand fell away from the drawer. "What?" he asked.

"Julie's going to be three in May, and we said we wanted to have our kids four years apart. It could take a few months for me to get pregnant." Of course, it had only taken the _once_ last time. They hadn't even been _trying_. "You okay with that?"

Maybe he wasn't. He was running his hand through his hair now and looking a little dazed. She glanced down and saw he'd half lost his erection.

"You're not okay with it," she said.

"It's just…why did you have to spring this on me right now? Why couldn't you have brought this up an hour ago when we were sitting on the couch and reading? Your timing is _really_ awful sometimes."

She winced apologetically. "Sorry. I just…I just thought maybe we should start trying. We _did_ talk about it before. We said four years apart."

"Yeah, we talked about it two _years_ ago!" He sighed. "I guess it's all right. I mean, we're paying the bills. I can always take on some extra private coaching if I need to." He laughed. "Damn, Tami." He shook his head. " _Sometimes_."

She smiled. "But you love me anyway, right?"

He laughed and kissed her. "I do love you," he agreed. "I don't know why sometimes, but I do."

She nibbled his earlobe in that way she knew drove him crazy. He cupped one of her breasts and teased the nipple. She felt a responsive stirring against her hip.

His voice was thick and low when he asked, "You want me to make you pregnant?"

"Yes."

"We might have to do it every night, you know," he said as he eased her legs apart with his knee. "Just to make _sure_."


	29. Chapter 29

**[About a Year Later]**

The Jaguars made it to the play-offs again, but once again failed to enter the 4A State Championships. Shelley came to church with Eric and Tami on Christmas Eve to watch Julie play an angel in the Christmas pageant. The pre-schooler had one line. Well, one _word_ , really. Julie got to shout, "Lo!" and wave at the shepherds.

After church, they went back home, and Tami slid the ham into the oven, along with a few other dishes she had prepared and refrigerated.

Shelley had the wherewithal to praise her niece for her fine performance, but she otherwise came trailing a cloud of gloom. Her fiancé had just broken off their engagement. This was _not_ the same man Shelley had lived with earlier, who had creeped Tami out by being Eric's age. No, this one was a ripe young nineteen.

"It's probably for the best, Shell," Tami reassured her as she draped the tree with the popcorn string Julie had helped her put together that morning. They'd decorated the tree last week, but this was the finishing touch. "Nineteen is a bit young to be getting married."

"Eric was only nineteen when he married you."

"It was a different time," Eric insisted from his recliner, where he sat watching football. Julie lay on her stomach at his feet. She was gazing at the neatly wrapped gifts beneath the tree. Grandma Merretti (Tami still wasn't used to her mother's last name) would be bringing more gifts tomorrow, and of course Grandma and Grandpa Taylor would bring some belated Christmas gifts when they arrived on New Year's Eve.

"It was like...eight years ago," Shelley reminded him. "It's not like it was another century."

"Well, things were different in our generation," Tami said.

" _Your_ generation? Tami, we have the same _mother_. That kind of makes the same generation by definition."

"And Eric was _almost_ twenty," Tami insisted.

"I'm over twenty, though," Shelley grumbled. " _I'm_ old enough. And where am I supposed to live now? The lease was in his name."

"Because he had a job," Eric said.

"I _have_ a job, Eric, thank you very much," Shelley insisted. "Much like your job."

Eric chortled.

"Well, we're both coaches, when you think about it."

Eric shook his head and turned up the volume on the television.

"We are. You coach football. I coach my clients in proper yoga technique."

"I thought you taught aerobics," Tami said.

"God, Tami! That was ages ago. I've been teaching yoga for at least six months now."

"What the hell is yoga?" Eric asked. Tami was surprised he was still listening to the conversation at this point.

"Stretching," Tami said. "It's basically some kind of stretching."

"It's far more than that," Shelley insisted. "It's about developing _mindful_ techniques. You could probably use some mindful techniques, Eric. Relaxing breathing."

"Tami'll make sure I engage in some _relaxing_ breathing, won't you, babe?" he asked with a wink.

"Good Lord, Eric." The oven started beeping, and Tami headed off to the kitchen.

"Smells fantastic, babe!" Eric called after her, but he didn't exactly get up to see if she needed any help.

 **[April]**

Shelley wasn't able to pay the lease on her yoga studio, and so she was evicted. She started offering "in-home private yoga consultations" instead of studio classes.

"Please tell me she's not turning tricks," Eric said when Tami told him about Shelley's new project one night as they were getting ready for bed.

"Lord, Eric, my sister is annoying, but she's not a whore."

He put his watch on the dresser, dropped his pants, yanked off his T-shirt and crawled into bed in only his boxers. "C'mere," he said. "We got a baby to make."

She rolled her eyes.

He jerked his head toward her side of the bed. "Biological clock's ticking, babe. You can't ignore it. I hear doggy style is the best position for getting pregnant."

"You're lucky I don't smack you right now."

"Hey, if that's how you like it. I'm here to accommodate you."

She laughed. "Try saying something romantic instead."

"Nah, you're already laughing. I always get laid when I make you laugh."

She slid into bed next to him. "I'm worried," she admitted. "It's already been over fifteen months."

"Well, sometimes it takes a while, right?"

"Yeah, but… _over_ a _year_? I read today that 85 percent of couples conceive within a year."

"So?" Eric said. "We're the other 15 percent. We obviously just need to have more sex."

"I don't know. I got pregnant that first time with no trouble at all. With no effort at all. I think we should see a fertility specialist."

"Tami, you sure know how to kill a mood."

"Eric, I'm serious. Something's wrong!"

He kissed her lips. "Nothing's wrong, babe. Just give it more time." He kissed her shoulder. "I love you. I love you, and sometime in the next year or two, I'm going to love the child you give me." He patted the bed between them. "Hey, you need to relax. Lie down here on your stomach. I'll rub your back."

"I bet you will. I bet that's not all you're going to rub."

"And I bet you're going to want me to rub more by the time I get there."

She smiled. "I bet you're right."

 **[May]**

It was right after Julie's 4th birthday party that Shelley asked to move in with them. All of the other guests had departed, and Julie was passed out in a sugar comma face down on her bed.

Shelley's private yoga consultations weren't raking in the income she'd hoped. She couldn't make the rent on her apartment. "Just until I find another job," she assured them.

"Or another boyfriend?" Eric asked.

Shelley ignored him. "I'm going to go back to teaching preschool. As soon as I can find an all-day school that will hire me, I'll be out of your hair. You have that huge third bedroom."

"It's not _huge_ , really," Tami said.

"You're not using it," Shelley told her.

Shelley hadn't meant for it to sting, but it did. Tami had expected to be turning that room into a nursery by now.

"I'm using it to store my game tapes," Eric insisted.

"We'll discuss it, Shelley," Tami told her sister. "We'll discuss it and let you know. When are you getting evicted?"

"In three weeks."

When Shelley shut the front door behind herself, Eric turned to Tami, raised a hand, and said, "No."

"Eric, she's got no place to go."

He began clearing the table of icing-smeared paper plates. "No," he said.

"It would only be for a couple of weeks, until she got on her feet."

He shoved the plates into the trash can. "No."

"I'm her _only_ family in the area."

He took a wash rag and wetted it in the sink. "No."

"You're a family man, Eric. You're a good husband and father. A good son to your parents. I know you don't want to turn your back on family."

He began wiping down the surface of the table. "No."

"Please?" she said. "Please. Not for her. For _me_. I promise, I won't let her stay more than a month. If she's still here in a month, we'll kick her out."

"You said a couple of weeks a minute ago."

"Couple…four….Come on, Eric. You'd do it for your own sister."

Eric sighed. "You're right. I guess Shelley _is_ my sister now." He leaned back against the counter and smiled at her. "But I'm at least getting laid for this, right?"

"We've probably got twenty minutes until Julie wakes up."

He chased her into the bedroom.


	30. Chapter 30

**[June]**

Shelley had taken to walking around in nothing but a towel when she got out of the shower in the morning.

"I'm sure she's just trying to get you to notice her," Tami complained one evening as they brushed their teeth in the master bathroom. "She's been starved for male attention for months." She spit in the sink and moved aside so Eric could spit.

"Hey," he said, rinsing his toothbrush, " _you_ invited her to live with us. Not _me_."

Tami rinsed her brush and rapped it against the side of the sink to get the excess water off. "I know. And I know she'd never _actually_ attempt to seduce _my_ husband, but she does like the attention of attractive males." She pointed her toothbrush at him. "So don't give it to her."

He put his toothbrush back in the holder. "I make it my policy to pay as little attention to Shelley as possible. But if it bothers you, why don't you just _tell_ her?"

She put her toothbrush beside his. "Because she'll just deny it, and then she'll turn it on me and claim that I'm insecure in our marriage, or something ridiculous like that."

Eric hit the switch as he stepped out of the bathroom. She followed.

"Are you?" he asked. "Insecure in our marriage?"

"Of course not!"

He was at his dresser now, unhooking his watch. "Because if you _are_ , I'll be happy to," he lowered his voice, " _reassure you_ of my affection tonight _as many times_ as you need."

She laughed. "I bet you will." She stood behind him and kissed his shoulder. "I'll take one."

"One?" he asked.

"One quick reassurance."

"Quick?"

"I've got a book I want to finish reading tonight."

 **[*]**

When school let out, Eric received an offer to replace an assistant coach at a 5A high school in Macedonia. "Tami," he said. "5A. I can't pass this up."

"What's the salary?"

"Teacher salary is lower, but the coaching stipend is higher, so… a little more than I'm making here. And Macedonia is cheaper."

"How many classes will you have to teach?"

"Only three history classes. In the spring semester, I'll have to teach a Shop class too."

She laughed.

"What?"

"You're….you're not exactly _handy_ , Eric."

"I can build a bird house. I can make an ashtray. But thanks for your support."

She kissed him. "You're moving up," she said. "I'm proud of you."

"This also might be the only way we can manage to get rid of Shelley," he said. "So I'm thinking of you too."

 **[July]**

The same day Eric and Tami got an offer on the house, Shelley moved in with a guy she'd initially met in a chat room using Tami's computer and dial-up modem.

"What's a chat room?" Eric asked in bed one night.

"It's…." Tami trailed off. "You know what, I'm not going to bother to explain. Let's just be glad she's got someplace to go."

"Have you vetted this guy?"

She snuggled up to him. "Aww…that's sweet. You're playing the protective big brother."

"I'm playing the protective husband. I don't want you upset when she ends up in pieces in someone's freezer."

Tami laughed. "He's a doctor."

"No. Not possible."

"Yes."

He turned on his side and faced her. "A _real_ doctor? With…like…a _medical_ degree?"

"He's an acupuncturists."

"I knew there had to be a catch."

"It's an ancient and legitimate medical practice, Eric. And Shelley's going to teach preschool again. She got a job offer." He rolled on his back and she settled her head on his chest. "I'm worried," she said.

"About what?"

"I really think we should see a fertility specialist when we get settled in Macedonia."

"Tami – "

"- If you're not willing, then I'll go by myself. We'll rule out any problems with me first."

 **[November]**

Eric sat on the couch sipping his post-game scotch, his dark red Macedonia Matadors cap resting on the coffee table. They'd gotten a three-bedroom house in Macedonia, with a garage this time, and they'd enrolled Julie in a 5-day, morning Pre-K program at the Methodist church they now attended.

Tami sat down next to him. He smiled. He must be expecting his victory lay. He'd get it, of course, but not right away.

She put a hand on his knee. "We need to talk about something."

His eyelids fluttered. His lips tightened into that not-quite-frown he sometimes got. "What have I done?"

"Nothing, sugar." She turned to face him, knee bent and leg half on the couch. "I saw the doctor again today. She can't pinpoint any reasons I would have fertility problems."

"See, I told you there was nothing wrong."

"Except that it's been close to two years now since we stopped using birth control. 95% of couples conceive within two years."

"Then we're the other 5%. And it hasn't been quite two years yet."

"Sugar…" She put her hand on his shoulder. "I really think you need to get checked."

"Checked for what?"

"Just…let them check your sperm count."

He shook his head. "No," he said. "Nah. My boys can swim." He pointed his glass down the hall in the direction of Julie's room. "I got a cute little girl to prove it. Unless I ought to be ordering up a paternity test on her."

Tami sighed. "Things change, Eric. Or maybe we just got lucky with her."

"So lucky I managed to knock you up the _one time_ the pill you took was defective?"

"Just consider it, Eric. Please."

"I'm not jerking off in any cup, Tami."

"Well I can…I can go in with you, you know. I can _assist_."

"Sexy. That's really sexy, babe." He stood up and walked to the liquor cabinet above the bookshelves where he stored a fraction of his game tape. He poured another scotch. He never had more than one. He swirled his glass, downed the liquid, and hissed.

"Don't you…" She could hear her voice hitch. "Don't you _want_ another child?"

He slammed the glass down on the shelf. "Of course I do, Tami. I would love to have a boy someday. A son of my own I can teach football to. Or another daughter to adore. Either way. And I think Julie should have a sibling. But, damn it, there's nothing wrong with me!"

"This isn't an assault on your masculinity, Eric! Lord! You just…you can't…" She shook her head and stormed down the hall.

When she got to the bedroom, she didn't know quite what to do with herself. She paced in anger a little, then stood for a minute with her arms crossed, and then went into the attached master bathroom and took a long, hot shower.

When she came out dressed in her flannel PJs, Eric was sitting up in bed on top of the comforter in sweats and a T-shirt. She sat down cautiously on her side of the bed, feet on the floor.

"You know," he said, "I finished that game tonight – and it was a good game – my quarterback did really well – won that game at the last minute because of the play I suggested – and I thought, I bet I've made my wife proud of me. She's going to think I was pretty hot out there tonight. She's going to be really attracted to me tonight. We're gonna go home, and she's gonna be all over me." He swallowed. "Well, you _were_ all over me all right. All over me about how I'm not …" He clenched the rest of the words down tight somewhere between his teeth.

She closed her eyes and shook her head. When she turned to look at him, he was looking off in the corner. "Don't be so sensitive, Eric."

He jumped out of bed and turned to face her. "You tell me you want me to talk about my feelings more. Well that's bullshit! Because when I do you just brush them off!"

"That's ridiculous!" She stood up. They squared off over the bed. "I care about your feelings! I do, Eric, but you know, I'd appreciate it if you cared about mine too. I have been worried about the possibility of infertility for months and months now. You want to talk about brushing something off?"

"Your timing, Tami! Your timing! If you wanted to talk about me jerking off into some cup, did you really have to do it the moment I've been feeling prouder of myself than I've felt in months? Couldn't you have congratulated me on my game first, couldn't – "

"- I did congratulate you on your game!"

The door eased open.

"I mean **_congratulate_** me on my game. Damn it, Tami, why – "

"- Mom? Dad? What's wrong?"

Eric froze. Tami nodded over his shoulder. He turned slowly to see Julie there, grasping her noodle-armed monkey tightly to her chest.

"Nothing, Monkey Noodle," he said.

"Why are you yelling at each other?"

"We were just…" Tami said, "Mamma just saw a shadow and was scared…so I was yelling and Daddy was yelling for me to calm down."

Julie's little brow furrowed. Eric scooped her up and kissed her cheek. "Everything's fine, Monkey Noodle. Come on. I'm gonna put you back to sleep. Read you some Dr. Seuss."

"The Lorax!"

"Yeah," he half whispered as he went through the door.

When he came back fifteen minutes later, Tami was sitting at the table before the vanity, starring at herself vacantly in the mirror. When she heard the door latch, she turned around.

"I'm sorry," they both said at the same time.

Tami laughed. "Jinx."

He came and kneeled before her, slid his arms around her waist, and raised his head to kiss her. "I'll go," he said. "To the…cup place. I'm sorry I wasn't listening to you and how worried you were. I just…I just thought nature should take its course. We had Julie so easily. I figured it just wasn't God's timing yet, you know? I _do_ want another kid. I'll go, if you want me to. I will."

"Thank you." She kissed him. "You played so well tonight, babe. That last minute call…I'm glad Coach Lopez let you try it."

"I love you, Tami."

They went to bed, and Eric held her for a long while. They began to kiss, ever so slowly. She whispered in his ear, "You were damn sexy out there tonight, Coach Taylor."

"Yeah?" he asked.

"Yeah," she whispered as she slid her hand into his sweat pants.

 **[*]**

A week later, Tami called the fertility clinic to schedule an appointment for Eric. Two hours after she hung up the phone, it occurred to her that her period really should have started by now. Before she picked Julie up from pre-K, she stopped by the drug store and got a home pregnancy test.

That night, when Julie was in bed, she took the test while Eric paced anxiously in the bedroom. She emerged from the master bathroom and showed him the stick.

"What's that mean?" he asked.

"It means I'm pregnant!"

He laughed and kissed her. "See, I told you!"

"I guess we can stop having so much sex now," she said.

He frowned, and she laughed, took his hand, and tugged him to bed.


	31. Chapter 31

**[February]**

The marching band was raising money by selling Valentine's Day roses in the school hallway. Eric bought a full dozen, even though they were horribly overpriced. He was happy to support the band. Football wouldn't be quite the same without the thunder. Also, he'd forgotten it was Valentine's Day.

Because it wasn't football season, Eric was home by 4:30. He came through the front door and found his daughter sitting at the kitchen table with some papers and a pencil. "Whatcha doin', Monkey Noodle?" he asked.

"Homework."

" _Homework?_ " She was only in pre-K. He walked over and peered at her papers. She was copying out her ABC's. Another paper had math problems: "1+1. 2+0. 2+2." He couldn't remember when he'd done that, but he was sure it wasn't preschool. He hadn't even _gone_ to preschool. "Where's your mamma?"

"In the bedroom."

They hadn't told Julie she was going to be a big sister just yet. Tami wasn't quite showing, but she would be soon, and they'd been discussing how best to share the news.

He made his way back with the roses, ready to see her delighted smile. It never failed to warm him when she smiled for him. But when he got there, he heard her crying in the master bathroom.

"Tami?" He pushed opened the door with the hand that wasn't holding the roses. "Are you all right?"

 **[*]**

The principal walked into Eric's Shop class at about the same time Jimmy McIntire hammered his hand to a board. Eric had been sitting behind his desk, hands behind his head, staring off into a corner, thinking about the baby that was not to be. It was a couple seconds before he heard the screaming.

Later that afternoon, Eric found himself in the principal's office for the first time since he'd gotten into that fist fight with Mo McArnold his junior year.

"You've got to supervise these boys, Eric," Principal Juarez insisted. "You can't just be – "

"- I know. I'm sorry. I've just got some stuff going - "

"- Stuff? You need to leave your stuff at the front door of this school building."

"Yes, sir."

"You ever teach Shop before?"

"No. I've mostly taught history. "

"Well, I'm putting Coach Erickson in that Shop class. I've got an English teacher that just up and quit on me. Since there are no hammers involved in English, I'm going to have you cover one of her classes for the rest of the year instead of the Shop class."

"English?" English had been his worst subject in high school. "I've never taught English."

"It's not that hard, Eric. You can read, can't you?"

 **[*]**

Tami was crying in bed again, those quiet tears. Eric could only tell by the way her body moved slightly beneath his arm. She probably thought he was asleep by now, but he wasn't. He slid a little closer. "I love you," he said.

"Then why don't you ever talk about it?"

"What's there to _talk_ about?"

She slid out from under his arm, threw on a heavy sweatshirt she'd left on the floor, and went out the bedroom door.

He joined her a few minutes later on the couch in the living room. She had the TV on, tuned to some infomercial, and muted. She was just staring at it.

"What do you want me to say?" he asked. "Tell me, and I'll say it."

"I want you to say what you feel!"

"I…I don't. I don't….feel."

"Fuck you!" She got up and went to the kitchen and opened a bottle of wine.

He came in and leaned against the refrigerator.

"I didn't mean it," she said. "I'm sorry."

He took the wineglass from her hand and set it on the counter top. "I… I guess I feel whatever you're feeling, Tami. I just feel it differently."

She collapsed against his chest, and he held her while she cried.

 **[March]**

Eric turned a page in the grammar book while Tami watched a _Seinfeld_ episode she had recorded. He had his arm across the back of the couch and she was leaned against his side, feet up on the hassock. Julie, thankfully, had finally accepted her bedtime. .They had "adult time" in the evenings now.

"Let's take Julie to the zoo this weekend," Tami said. "I don't want to go any further than that for a day trip."

" _Farther_ ," he said. "You don't want to go any _farther_. Not _further_. It's okay. It's a common mistake."

She plucked the grammar book from his hands and shut it. She smirked. "Why don't you and me go to bed?"

"You and - " He smiled. "Oh. You're just provoking me now."

"Just so you know, for future reference, it's not sexy when you correct my grammar."

"How about if I quote Shakespeare?" he asked as they stood and began walking to the bedroom.

"That might work, if you weren't teaching them Julius Cesar."

Just inside the door, he put his arms around her from behind, pulled her back, kissed her neck, and whispered, " _Passion, I see, is catching_."

She laughed. "Is that the best quote you've got?"

" _Et tu, Brute?_ "

Later, when they were lying cuddled together in the aftermath of their lovemaking, he said, "I honestly don't know what I'm doing in this English class. History is easy…but I don't know how to talk about literature."

"You're a teacher at heart, Eric. It's just part of who you are. You'll find a way."

She dozed off and woke briefly when she felt him ease out his arm from under her. She saw his shadow leave the room and went back to sleep.

 **[*]**

Tami glanced down at the play diagram Eric had left on the kitchen counter and smiled. Underneath the usual X's and O's, he'd written, in small letters, various labels – Brutus, Julius, Antony, Cassius, Cicero…

 **[April]**

After Eric took roll in his English class he was covering until year end, he said, "Pack up your backpacks again. We're walking on down to the theatre to see some fifty-minute Shakespeare."

"What?" a girl asked.

"My cousin recently joined a traveling Shakespeare troupe. I talked him into getting the troupe to travel on over to us. They're going to do a condensed version of Julius Ceasar for y'all."

"Cool," she said. "Is your cousin as hot as you are?"

"Just pack up."

 **[*]**

"That one would make a fine actress," John Paul said as he watched Julie perform a melodramatic dance in the living room.

"Jules, honey," Tami said. "Go on and brush your teeth and get in your PJs and start reading. I'll be in to tuck you in in a bit."

When Julie had left the living room, John Paul said, "A fine actress. She's gorgeous, too, like her mother."

"Oh, stop," Tami said, but she didn't really want him to stop. It was always fun to flirt with John Paul, because she knew it didn't bother Eric. Sometimes Eric _pretended_ it bothered him, but today he wasn't even bothering to pretend. He was just drinking his beer quietly. "So, who's the lady of the hour?" she asked John Paul. "Or are you single for a change?"

"Tami," John Paul leaned forward in his arm chair and put his beer bottle on the coffee table, "I am madly, desperately, hopelessly in love."

Tami laughed. "I don't believe it for a second."

"I am. She's an actress in the troupe. Rebekah. Eric met her."

Eric nodded.

"And he can vouch for my adoration, can't you, cuz?"

"You do seem to like her."

"We're going to buy the company," John Paul said. "Rebekah and I. We're going to buy it together, make a half dozen babies, homeschool them, and tour the nation with them. We're going to name the first one Hamlet."

Tami shook her head. "Are you even slightly serious?"

"I'm utterly serious. Eric is going to be my best man in July."

Tami glanced at Eric, who nodded.

"Are you having a big Catholic wedding?" Tami asked.

"Well, no…we're having a Jewish wedding, actually. Reformed. Very reformed. Agnositc."

Tami laughed again. "I'll believe it when I see it."

John Paul rose, "Well, thank you for a lovely dinner, Tami, but I have to be going. My fiance is waiting for me at camp."

"Camp?" asked Tami as she stood up.

"It's an RV park," said Eric as he, too, rose.

"Oh," Tami said with disappointment.

"I know," said John Paul as he walked toward the front door. "You pictured gypsies and tambourines." He turned around. "It was good catching up with you again." He took Tami's hand and kissed it.

Eric nodded. "Thanks for…uh…entertaining my class."

John Paul opened the door. He held one hand on the knob. "Thanks for agreeing to be my best man. One thing I forgot to mention. It's a themed wedding, of course. Shakespeare, of course. So you'll have to wear a cod piece." With that, John Paul shut the door.

Eric, beer clasped in hand, stared at the closed door. "He damn well better be kidding about that."

Tami laughed so hard she had to take a step back.

"What's so funny?" a PJ-clad Julie asked as she wandered out of the bathroom.


	32. Chapter 32

**[May]**

Sometimes, Tami still mourned the baby that was not to be, but today was Julie's fifth birthday, and she could only delight in the baby that was.

Although…Julie wasn't a baby anymore. She'd be going to kindergarten in less than four months. Tami would be putting her on a _school bus_ and waving goodbye.

Her heart half broke at the thought.

 **[*]**

"I think I should go back to school for my Master's in Psychology when Julie starts kindergarten," Tami told Eric over dinner the next night. Julie had already been excused to go play.

Eric set down his beer. "How will you squeeze that in? Isn't kindergarten only three and a half hours?"

"No. They changed it this year, hon. It's all-day kindergarten at half the schools. Julie's zoned for one of the all-day ones."

"All day?" he asked. "For five-year-olds? What are they going to do?"

"Learn," she said.

"And play I hope." The only thing Eric remembered about kindergarten was finger painting, singing songs, and playing football. Maybe a little tether ball, too.

"So…what do you think? I can schedule all my classes for when Julie is in school and for Saturday afternoons. You'll be home most Saturdays, right?"

"Where would you go?"

"Macedonia Christian University has a good program."

He took his napkin out of his lap and set it on the table. "How much is this going to cost?"

She looked down at her plate when she told him.

"We can't afford that!" he said.

"We could take out loans," she suggested.

He sighed. "You know I don't like to go into debt. You know how I feel about that."

"We took out a few loans for college," she reminded him.

"And we're still paying them off. What do you need a graduate degree for anyway?"

"Fine. Never mind." She stood up and picked up her plate. "Forget I mentioned it. Forget I want to improve myself and maybe do something to pursue _my_ career goals for a change."

The plate cracked when she threw it into the sink. She cursed.

Eric was standing behind her now. "I'll clean up," he said. "Why don't you go check on Julie?"

Later that night, when he climbed into bed and sat up next to her, he crossed his arms over his chest. She pretended to still be engrossed in her book.

"I could take on some extra private coaching," he said. "There's this kid, Lucas Mize…he's a JV quarterback in Dillon. His dad approached me about coaching him privately. I wrote it off at the time because it would be a twenty-two mile commute, and these kids whose parents' hire private coaches, you know…they tend to be a pain in the ass. But I could call him back up. I could accept. I'd make a little extra money. Still…it wouldn't be nearly enough for tuition."

"I said forget about it."

"We could…." he sighed. "We could ask my dad to make up the rest. You know he's always trying to give us money."

"And we're always refusing." Except for the wedding money and that "baby shower" check, Tami and Eric had turned down every financial offer.

"I could humble myself this one time," Eric said. "So could you. He doesn't know what to do with that outrageous salary he's making. Education has always been important to him, and he considers you to be his daughter."

She laughed. "Does he?"

"He's not the most expressive man in the world, but he _does_ like you. And if we asked, I think he'd be happy to pay a good chunk of your tuition."

"I don't know, hon. What kind of strings would he attach to it, do you think? Why can't we just take out loans?"

Eric rubbed his forehead. "You know how I feel about debt."

"It's not like we have debtor's prison anymore, Eric."

"We already have a sizable mortgage, Tami. _I've_ still got some college loans left. I wouldn't sleep at night."

She shook her head.

"Sorry I'm so damn responsible. I want you to be happy, Tami. Believe me. I do."

He said it so sincerely that she couldn't help but smile. "I _am_ happy." She kissed him. "Very happy." She kissed his ear. "Are you happy?"

"Mhmmmm… You know what would make me even happier?"

She straddled him where he sat, nibbled his neck, and pressed against his lap. "I have a guess."

 **[*]**

Eric called his father the next day. He didn't ask for money. He just casually mentioned that Tami wanted to go back to get her master's, but that they'd decided not to do it because of the expense.

Two days later, a Priority Mail envelop arrived addressed to Tami. The return address was El Paso University. As Eric and Tami sat at the kitchen bar enjoying their evening wine, and Julie lay on the living room couch enjoying her evening television show, Tami opened it. Before removing the contents, she took another sip of wine to steel her nerves.

She and Eric had never resumed using birth control. Tami didn't want to be downing one or two glasses a wine a day when she might get pregnant. So these days she only drank when she was on her period, as now. Those few days a month, though, they would split a bottle of wine every night, and she'd always claim the third glass.

She pulled out the letter and unfolded it. She flipped over the check that had been inserted between the folds. Eric glanced at it. "That's enough for half the program, isn't it?"

"At least." She began reading the letter aloud to Eric: "Dear Tami, I've never understood how this psychology mumbo jumbo operates, but I know it helped my marriage." Tami looked at Eric. "They had marriage counseling?"

"Not that I know of. I guess they did."

"I guess it worked. They're still married." Tami continued reading, "There's no reason you shouldn't pursue educational excellence just because my son is frugal."

"Who _taught_ me to be frugal does he think?" Eric complained. "You know he used to water down the orange juice when I was in first grade? He still had half his AFL salary in the bank, and he was watering down the orange juice."

"Your mom told me they were living off the savings when you were in first grade. She'd already quit her job, and your dad was just interning then, trying to get some big management job. He had a tiny stipend. They had almost no income that year."

"Still, even when he was making a management salary," Eric complained, "he used to buy all my toys at garage sales. Even my bike. And the chain kept falling off. He said it would build character and athleticism if I could keep up with the other boys even after stopping to snap back on my own chain."

Tami laughed. She continued reading the letter: "It's my policy never to make personal loans, so please consider this a gift. And be sure to take a Sports Psychology class." She folded the letter back up. "Is that the only string, do you think?"

"If so, it's not a bad one. Wouldn't hurt me to read your textbook." He scratched his head. "What if….uh…." He almost never spoke about this. "What if you _do_ get pregnant again? What about school then?"

"I'm going to finish. I might spread out my last year over two years if we have a baby by then, but I'm going to finish."

 **[June]**

That summer, Eric drove to Dillon from Macedonia three days a week to coach Lucas Mize so he would be able to pay the other half of Tami's tuition. Before heading back to Macedonia one evening, he told Mr. Mize, "Just to let you know upfront, I have to take two days off of the coaching the third week of July because I'll be traveling to Houston for my cousin's wedding."

"If my son's going to be able to lead the Panthers to State by his senior year of high school," Mr. Mize said, "we can't lose a single session."

It had been a hard session, with Lucas insisting that the drills Eric was putting him through were unnecessary because he already knew it all. Eric explained to the rising sophomore about muscle memory, and Lucas gave him more lip, so he'd made the boy do up-downs before they went back to the drills. He was already irritated before Mr. Mize's words aggravated him even more. "Then fire me and get somebody else," Eric said bluntly. "I'm damn well not going to skip my cousin's wedding. I'm his best man."

He almost wished Mr. Mize _would_ fire him. Lucas was a good quarterback, but he had too deep a sense of entitlement. He was too sure of himself and of his future. What was this kid going to do if _he_ ever fell out of a tree and broke _his_ leg?

Eric was passionate about football, but this kid had _nothing_ else. At least Eric had to credit his father with this much – the man had been indiscriminately strict about his performance not just in football, but also in school. Lucas, on the other hand, was skating by in his classes. If football proved a bust, people weren't going to be handing him jobs on silver platters, the way they handed him grades. When Eric's dreams had been ground to dust, he'd at least had his academic self-discipline to fall back on – that and Tami, who had given him purpose and direction.

"Fine," Mr. Mize told him, "but you better put in an extra couple of hours the next week."

 **[July]**

Eric paced the ten steps from the closed master bathroom door to the bed and then back. He did it three more times before calling through the door, "Aren't you done yet?"

"I'm going to take another one," Tami answered through the door.

"Why? What was the first one?"

"I'm going to take another one," she repeated.

Eric resumed his pacing, but the bathroom door opened when he was halfway to the bed. He whirled around. "You didn't take a second one?"

"My period just started. Just now. Guess I was just late." She looked down at the carpet and swallowed. "We're out of wine."

"I'll go get a bottle."

"Get two."

He slammed the front door on his way out and then slammed the door to his pick-up when he got in. He wasn't much kinder to the door of the nearby convenience mart. The mart had some table wine, but they were out of the kind Tami liked, so he would have to go to the grocery store - which gave him a chance to slam the door of his truck a couple more times.


	33. Chapter 33

"That was the strangest wedding ever," Eric said to Tami as he danced with her at John Paul's reception. Julie was currently in the company of her Grandpa Taylor, who was twirling her around the floor.

"It was actually more traditional than I expected," Tami said. Eric was looking quite handsome in his very ordinary tuxedo, sans cod piece. "Although they did have _a lot_ of readings. A lot."

"What was with the stomping on the glass? Who cleans that up?"

Tami laughed. "I think that's a Jewish wedding custom, hon."

"But she doesn't even believe in God."

"It was nice of John Paul to invite Shelley," Tami said, ignoring his grumbling, "even though he's only met her three times."

"Well, I think he figured since she's your sister, he ought to include her."

"She's over at the bar assaulting Philip Andrew," Tami said. "Should I intervene?"

"Nah. Dance with me." He rested his cheek against hers. "How often do we get to dance slow like this?"

 **[*]**

"Oh my God," Shelley said, sidling up to Eric's cousin Philip Andrew at the open bar. He had on a suit and dark red tie. "Did you leave the monastery?"

"Uh…just for a couple of days. I'm sorry…remind me of your name again?"

"Shelley! Tami's sister."

Philip smiled. "Ah…yes…." He raised his glass of red wine to her. "Must have been Julie's christening when I last saw you."

"Chardonnay," she told the bartender. Then she put a hand on Philip Andrew's shoulder. "You look fantastic!"

"Uh…" He smiled. "You look…lovely too."

"How's the monastery? I thought you'd be in like a brown robe with your hood up and everything."

"Yeah, we don't really wear those outside the monastery."

"So," she asked, taking the wine glass the bartender had just slid her, "do I call you brother or father?"

"You can call me Philip."

"Is it hard," Shelley asked, "having no contact with the outside world? Not even being able to talk to each other?"

He laughed. "We have phones. And we talk to each other plenty."

"Oh."

"We also don't self-flagellate."

"Well, I would guess not. I guess that would violate your vows of chastity."

Philip Andrew flushed. "No…uh…I mean we don't flog ourselves for penance, like you see in the Monty Python skits. It's not like that."

"So, have you taken your vows? There was like a pledge year, right?"

"I was a novice for a year. Then I was a junior. But I took my solemn vows recently."

"What are all the vows?"

"Well, chastity, of course. Obedience. And poverty. I don't technically own anything except my clothes and a few books, and I don't really consider those my own. I don't have a car. One of my brothers picked me up and drove me here. I mean, one of my biological brothers."

"So what do you do all day? Like…pray?"

"Yeah. And worship. And study. And meditate. And I brew beer. I'm the master brewer now."

"So…have you really _never_ had sex?"

"Um…"

"What's that _feel_ like? To _never_ have sex?"

"Um…"

 **[*]**

"That poor man is beet red," said Tami. "I should really go rescue him from Shelley." She began to pull away from Eric.

"Grown men don't need rescuing," Eric insisted, jerking her closer against himself. "Not even from Shelley."

"Is that a cod piece," she asked, "or are you just happy to dance with me?"

 **[August]**

Eric was going to be late for the first day of school today. He didn't care. He had to be here for this. He stood by the bus stop, his arm around his wife's shoulders, and waved to Julie who was waving through the window. Julie had climbed up those bus stairs without a hesitation in the world. Weren't kids supposed to cling to their parent's leg a little first?

When the bus disappeared around the corner, he bent his head and kissed the tear that was slipping down Tami's cheek.

"I have to get to school myself," she said. Her graduate school classes had started last week. She'd had to pay a neighbor to watch Julie. "And you have to get to work."

"She's growing up, isn't he?" he asked.

Tami sighed. "Yeah, she is."

He squeezed her a little tighter.

 **[Spring]**

Tami had not gotten pregnant since the miscarriage. She thought about once again bringing up the subject of Eric getting tested, but every time she thought about it, she shelved the idea. The timing never seemed right. He'd been under a lot of pressure at work.

The school system had begun a new merit pay system, and the principal was evaluating his classes, randomly popping in and sitting in the back. Eric was also under consideration for Macedonia's Teacher of the Year Award, so he had someone from that committee also evaluating his classes. The head coach of the Macedonia Matadors had been diagnosed with cancer, and Eric had at the last minute been put in charge of spring training, which was apparently a disaster, with the new quarterback making error after error and in-fighting among the assistant coaches, who resented Eric's new, temporary position of leadership. There was talk that Coach Lopez wasn't going to be able to return next season, and as much as Eric wanted to be promoted to the job of head coach, it looked like he was going to be passed over. They were courting someone from the outside.

Meanwhile, Tami invited Julie's entire kindergarten class to her 6th grade birthday party, and only one kid showed up, despite eleven RSVPs. Julie started crying, Eric started looking like he wanted to kill someone, and Tami started making phone calls until a few more kids showed up.

Two weeks later, they drove to El Paso for Betty Taylor's big 50th birthday party.

By late June, however, things had settled down. Eric had won that Teacher of the Year Award. His fellow assistant coaches no longer resented him – instead they resented the _new_ head coach, who had been brought in from Austin. Eric had qualified for merit pay next year and wouldn't be evaluated again for some time. So Tami thought tonight might be a good night to broach the subject of going to the fertility clinic. He had already said he would do it, after all, before the pregnancy surprised them.

Yes, it would be good timing this time. They'd had a relaxing evening. Julie was in bed. They were cuddled on the couch, wine glasses on the coffee table, watching an X-files episode they'd recorded in November. Eric never watched anything except football in the fall, so late spring typically involved some catch-up on television shows.

"I don't know why Mulder doesn't just up and kiss her," Eric said.

"It's never a good idea to get involved with someone you're working with, hon."

"Scully needs to get laid something awful."

She laughed. "You make fun of my sister for her Beverley Hills 90210 obsession, and look how into this you are!"

"This is monsters and aliens and stuff," he said defensively. "It's not a teen soap opera!"

"And yet you're worried that the main characters haven't established a romance."

"I'm just getting tired of all the sexual tension, that's all. If they just went to bed together, we could focus more on the conspiracy. Which, by the way, makes no sense so far."

The credits began to roll. Tami sat up straight and turned to him. She was just about to ask if he'd consider getting fertility tested again when the phone rang.

Eric went to answer it. She stopped the VHS tape and began rewinding it.

When he came back, he didn't sit next to her on the couch. He slid into the arm chair, a hand on each arm. A line jumped in his jaw, and his nostrils quivered.

"Hon, what's wrong?"

"That was my dad."

"Is he sick?" She stood up and came over to him.

"Nah. It's my mom." His voice choked. "She's…."

Her hand was already on his shoulder. "She's what?"

"She's dead."


	34. Chapter 34

Betty Taylor had been driving home from work one evening when her tire suddenly blew out. Her car had spun across the double yellow line, where it was hit by a speeding truck coming from the opposite direction.

It was Tami's turn to comfort Eric upon the loss of a parent. She sat next to him on the living room couch in the Taylors' El Paso house with her arm firmly around his shoulders. The company had finally cleared out of the house after the three-hour-long wake. For the first time ever, John Paul hadn't flirted with Tami, and Philip Andrew hadn't cracked open a book.

Tami's father in-law sat stiffly in a corner arm chair, next to the unlit fireplace, his jaw set tight, staring out the window at the pool.

Julie climbed into her grandfather's lap and wrapped her arms tightly around his neck. She snuggled her head against his shoulder. "Grandpa," she said, "I'm going to help you cry."

And James did cry, with his face buried in his granddaughter's long, blonde hair.

That night, Julie slept on the couch in the upstairs living room while Eric and Tami took the guest bedroom. Eric lay on his back in bed, tense and silent. Tami put a hand on his chest. "I want to help you, Eric. What can I do? What do you need from me?"

He took her hand from his chest and slid it down.

"Really?" she asked, trying not to laugh at the incongruity of it all.

"Tami, I'm not being flippant. I _need_ you."

"Of course you do." She kissed his cheek and began to stroke him.

He reached for the hem of her night shirt and pulled it up. He tugged at her panties. "Take these off," he ordered, and she did.

"Tell me what you need," she breathed into his ear.

He needed it hard and fast and angry. She could feel his tears wetting her neck as he took her.

Eric groaned out his release and rolled onto his back. He trembled for the longest time. She couldn't tell if it was from the orgasm, or from the anger, or from the grief, but she pulled off the shirt he hadn't removed from her, pressed her naked body against his, and held him until the trembling had ceased.

"I'm sorry," he whispered.

"For what?"

"I was a bit rough with you."

"It's okay, sugar."

"But you didn't…you didn't cum."

She kissed his shoulder. "I didn't need to."

"Do you want me to -"

"- No," she said. "I'm fine. This is your best chance to fall asleep. I just want you to get some sleep, Eric." He'd slept three hours the night his father called, and only two the night before the funeral. "Please. While you can."

She was the one to fall asleep, though, in the warmth of his arms. When she woke up, the clock read two AM. She put on her T-shirt and a pair of shorts and went looking for him. She went past Julie on the couch and down the stairs. She paused in the foyer right before the living room. From where she stood, she could just make out the half empty bottle of whiskey on the coffee table, the two glasses, and her husband's head.

Two glasses. Strange, because her father-in-law didn't drink.

"Do you remember…" But it was her father-in-law's deep voice, all right, rising from the living room. "…summer, and your mother insisted on that family photo…"

"…those awful costumes," Eric said. "We tried to stop her."

James laughed.

"And do you remember," Eric said. "That one Thanksgiving, when Mom…."

Tami crept quietly back to the bedroom.

 **[*]**

The next morning, Julie was singing at the top of her lungs in the kitchen at 6:00 AM. The girl always woke up at the crack of dawn, even on Saturdays. Eric had sworn that when she was a teenager and trying to sleep in, he was going to stand outside her door on a Saturday morning at 5:55 AM with a pot and a spoon and just start banging.

Tami rushed downstairs to shush her. She put on cartoons for the girl.

Next she filled a glass of water and set it by Eric's bed side, along with two aspirin she fished out of the bathroom medicine cabinet. She'd seen the empty whiskey bottle by the kitchen sink.

He stirred, groaned, opened one eye, and looked at her.

"I'm taking Julie out," she said, "So y'all can sleep. There's water and aspirin when you're ready for it."

He groaned and closed his eye.

When her hand was on the bedroom door, Eric said, "Tami, I love you. So very much."

[*]

When Tami and Julie got back, Julie saw the neighborhood kids playing outside and asked to join them. Tami let her and went into the house. She could hear the shower running upstairs and guessed Eric must be in it. Her father-in-law was sitting alone at the kitchen table with a glass of water and a cup of coffee, both untouched. He was staring at the stove.

She sat down across from him. "You're going to get counseling, James."

He looked at her. "I don't need counseling, Tami. I have a priest."

"You're going to see a grief counselor," Tami insisted. "A trained psychiatrist. And if you need medication, you're going to take it. And it's fine that you and Eric shared a bottle of whiskey last night. You guys needed to share that, to share that bottle and to share those memories, but you're not going to start drinking now to drown your sorrows."

"I don't intend to."

"I did some research, and I found the best grief counselor in El Paso. I'll leave you the information before we go back to Macedonia."

She could see him tense all over, starting with his jaw. She waited for him to tell her no, to scold her for being meddlesome. But he didn't. He closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, the tension began to drain out of his body. "Betty was fond of you," he said when he finally spoke. "She was very fond of you. I suppose she'd want me to listen to you about this."

Tami nodded. "She would." She stood up. "Now I'm going to cook you and Eric some good hangover food."

 **[*]**

They stayed with Mr. Taylor for three more days. The hardest part for Tami was cleaning out and packaging up Betty Taylor's clothes for charity. James had asked her to handle the task.

Half way through, Tami sat down on the floor of the walk-in closet and cried.

Her father-in-law found her there. She heard his footsteps approaching and hastily wiped her arm across her face and stood up.

Mr. Taylor looked down at the carpet when he realized she'd been crying. "I…uh…I forgot to tell you…the ankle-length blue dress…Betty's sister-in-law wants that one. If you haven't already packed it up."

"I'll find it," Tami said.

He cleared his throat. "You loved her, too," he said, still not meeting her eyes.

"I did." She wiped a tear from beneath her eye with a thumb.

Her father-in-law finally looked up from the floor. "I'm not sure…what I'm supposed to do now."

"Live. Go on with your life. You have to."

"No, I mean…about you crying. Am I supposed to…hug you?"

She laughed. "You don't want to hug me, James."

He took in a shaky breath. "She loved you, too, you know. Betty was so grateful Eric found someone who could love him the way you love him. She knew that's not an easy thing to find." He choked and looked down at the floor again. " _I_ know it's not an easy thing to find." He turned his back to her. Before he walked away, he said, "Thank you for doing all this."

[*]

Around lunch time, the doorbell rang. There was a woman, maybe ten years older than Tami, at the door. She'd brought James a casserole, and it was clear that he wanted her to leave, but she kept touching his shoulder and pouring out her condolences and telling him to call her up anytime. Tami noticed she didn't have a wedding ring. James kept trying to make an excuse to shut the door, and the woman kept ignoring his social cues, so Tami intervened and, in that sugary blunt way of hers, got the woman off his stoop.

Thirty minutes later another woman came by with another casserole. This one was closer to Mr. Taylor's age, but she, too, was not wearing a wedding ring. Twice she reminded Mr. Taylor that she had unexpectedly lost a spouse three years ago, and Mr. Taylor looked to Tami with pleading eyes.

"We're so grateful for the food," Tami told her with her sweet southern smile, "but we really need to be going now to handle some…family affairs." She shut the door.

Twenty minutes after that, the doorbell rang yet again.

Tami joined Eric on the second story balcony that overlooked the rock garden and driveway, where he had retreated to drink a beer. He was watching the latest woman drive off in her car.

"My mother was buried three days ago," he said, "and already they're coming out of the woodwork."

Tami sighed. Mr. Taylor was a handsome man who wouldn't turn fifty for another week, a relatively young widower with a well-paying job. She knew it was bound to happen eventually, but Eric was right about the timing. "It's crass," she agreed. "They weren't very subtle."

"That first one couldn't be more than forty. And my dad's _fifty_. Almost."

"Well, a lot of women like older men. Experience is sexy to a lot of women. And your dad looks pretty young for his age. But I'm sure he won't think of seeing another woman for a couple of years."

Eric leaned against the rail. "He'll _never_ think of seeing another woman."

Tami didn't dare disagree with him. She stepped forward and put a hand on his back.

He turned slightly to look at her. "Some guys find older women sexy too," he said and smiled. It was the first time she'd seen him smile in days. "Experienced women."

"I'm only nine months older than you, sugar. And I wasn't _that_ experienced."

"But you taught me a thing or two. Remember?" He bent his head to kiss her. "You were a good tutor."

She kissed him back, deeply enough, she hoped, to make him forget his pain for a moment.


	35. Chapter 35

Eric had a horrible season in the fall. There were a lot of reasons – he was still grieving his mother's death, the new head coach showed no concern for his opinion, and there were a couple of highly overinvolved parents. Eric began to talk about quitting. "Maybe I should just teach next year," he said. The assistant coaching was practically a full-time job, but it wasn't _paid_ as a full-time job.

"Don't give up now," Tami told him. "You've just had _one_ bad season. You _love_ this game. You _live_ this game. I know you, and you're never going to be happy if you walk away from coaching. You're going to be head coach of a high school team one day, sugar. Hell, you're going to be head coach of a college team one day."

He sighed. "I don't know," he said. "I just don't know anymore."

That winter break, Tami encouraged him to volunteer to help coach an indoor, Junior Pee Wee football camp. Eight- to ten-year-old kids would be coming from all over the west Texas region for this special winter camp. Tami thought that maybe working with those little kids, who were just learning to really love the game, would restore his love for coaching.

He got back to Macedonia at 6 PM on New Year's Eve, all on fire for the game, laughing and talking about how these kids didn't even know how to put their shoulder pads on, but they knew how to love football.

He chattered on and on to Tami about one kid in particular - some amazing young kid he'd met at the camp, some kid he was sure was going to be a star quarterback one day, some kid he thought he could personally train up and see all the way to the NFL.

Some kid from Tami's own home town of Dillon, Texas.

Some kid named Jason Street.

 **[*]**

"You ever think of moving back home?" Eric asked Tami one evening over dinner. "I was thinking of trying to get on at Dillon Junior High." Jason Street would be going to that junior high soon.

She'd grown up in North Dillon, which was the next town over from Dillon. He'd lived there for one year in high school, long enough for them to meet and fall for each other. "That area isn't home anymore, sugar. It hasn't been home for a long time. And it was never home for you."

"But it _was_ for you. You _grew up_ there," he reminded her.

"I don't know anyone there anymore."

"I'm sure you do, Tami. Not a lot of people leave. I know for a fact Buddy Garrity's still there. His dealership has taken off. He's got two girls and a boy now."

Her hand froze on her wine glass. "So you've _already_ been putting feelers out, then, have you?"

Julie's eyes ping ponged from her mother to her father as they talked.

"My dad stayed in touch with Buddy and put me in touch with him." Buddy had worked for Mr. Taylor in his early twenties. "He's a _huge_ booster now. I mean… _the_ booster for the Panthers. Which is where Jason Street will end up one day."

"I haven't finished my master's degree, hon. I still have a year left. I don't want to move to Dillon and have to commute over twenty miles to classes."

"I've commuted to Dillon to coach Lucas."

"Not every day. I have classes five days a week."

"You commuted from UH to MWU."

"I didn't have a _child_. How am I going to be home in time for Julie to get out of school? We'd have to put her in after-school care."

"Tami….you should see this Jason kid. He's got a gift. With the right coach, he's going to break records. And I'm the right coach, babe."

She shook her head. "I should have never sent you to that camp."

"I don't want to move!" Julie whined. "I have friends here!"

Eric glanced at Julie.

"We're not moving today, Jules," Tami said. "Look, Eric, the schools here in Macedonia ISD are K through 2nd and then 3rd through 6th. Julie's going to have to change schools anyway after second grade, and I'll be done with my master's by then. So why can't we just wait one more year to move?"

Eric cleared his throat. "We'll discuss this _later_ ," he said.

 **[July]**

Mr. Mize had cut Coach Taylor loose in favor of another private coach for his son Lucas. It looked like Lucas might lead the Dillon Panthers all the way to State next season, but of course Eric wouldn't get any credit. Still, he didn't want to stop coming to Dillon. He proposed to Jason Street's parents that they allow him to coach the young boy.

"We want Jason to do well, of course," Mr. Street said, "but he's _only_ in Pee Wee, and we really don't have the money for private coaching right now."

Eric volunteered to work with Jason for free. While he was in Dillon, he checked out the junior high football team and talked job opportunities with Buddy. In fact, he spent an entire weekend with Buddy at his house in mid-July.

"I can't come to Dillon this season," Eric told him over dinner at the Applebee's that had apparently moved into town two years ago. "My wife's got to finish up her degree and she doesn't want Julie switching schools until after second grade. But I can be here next season."

"Well, there's not going to _be_ a position next season, Eric. Dillon Junior High needs a teacher _this_ school year. They need an assistant coach _this_ school year. You don't take it, they're gonna hire someone else. Tami's just going to have to commute."

Eric shook his head. "I've already signed a contract in Macedonia. I've already promised Tami we'd stay one more year."

"Then I don't know what to tell you, Eric. If you don't strike now, it's not likely you'll find a job in Dillon anytime in the next three to four years."

Eric rubbed his forehead. "Well, I can at least keep driving up to coach Jason privately for now."

Buddy nodded over Eric's shoulder, and Eric turned to see a man in a blue cap. "This is one of the Panther's assistant coaches, Mac McGill," Buddy said. "Mac, I wanted you to meet my friend Eric. He used to work out your boy Lucas Mize."

Mac sat down and took off his cap. "Uh, yeah. I've heard your name a lot. Good to finally meet you in person." He extended his hand and they shook. Mac sized Eric up. "Buddy tells me he thinks you're gonna end up coaching for the Panthers one day. I hope you don't have your eye on the top dog position, though, because that one's got my name written all over it."

 **[*]**

Eric kissed Tami and scooped up his daughter when he walked through the door. "Agh," he said, "You're getting so big."

Julie giggled and kissed each of his cheeks. "I'm going into second grade, Daddy. I'm hardly a baby."

" _Hardly_?' He chuckled and set her on her feet. "You're still my baby."

"What did you bring me?"

"Well, there are so many tourist shops in Dillon, so it was difficult to choose."

"What did you get?" She dragged his suitcase from the foyer to the living room. He picked it up, set it on the coffee table, and clicked it open. "These are from my friend Buddy. He and I used to work together when I was in high school." Eric handed Julie a small Panthers T-shirt and a Panthers cap. "One day I'm gonna coach the Panthers to State." He winked at her.

"Is that so?" Tami asked, putting a hand on his back. "Does it look like they'll have a job twelve months from now?"

"No. But I can keep coaching Jason privately until a job opens up. And we might discuss moving to Midland when you finish your degree. I've got to get off the Matadors. I can't stand the head coach. There might be an opening at Midland High next year. It's 5A. And it's nineteen miles from Dillon, so I can still coach Jason."

Julie put the cap on her head. It was too big. She dug through the suitcase in search of more gifts. She unearthed a stuffed panther and squeezed it tight. "Too cute!" she said. Then she looked back at the rumpled contents of the suitcase. "Is that all?"

"Monkey Noodle," Eric said. "You got to learn to be content with what you're given. You can't always be looking for something better."

"But I want something better."

He snatched the stuffed panther out of her hand. "Guess you don't want this then."

"Give it back!" She reached for it.

Eric cradled the little black animal tightly to his chest. "But I thought this panther wasn't good enough for you."

"Good Lord," said Tami, shaking her head and leaving the room.

"It _is_ good enough!" Julie insisted. "I want it back!"

"Oh…" Eric loosened his grip on the panther. " _Now_ you want it back. Now that you see _someone else_ wants it."

He let Julie rip the panther from his hands. She cuddled it beneath her chin and squeezed.

"Let that be a lesson to you, Monkey Noodle." He said. "When you've got a good thing, don't take it for granted."


	36. Chapter 36

**[October]**

When Eric came home from afternoon practice with the Matadors, Julie was sitting at the kitchen table and doing her homework. So was Tami. His wife had her highlighter out, and she'd just marked up about one-fourth of the page she was reading.

Eric put a hand on his daughter's head and glanced at her work. "That looks like multiplication," he said. "I didn't do multiplication until third grade."

"It's just 0's and 1's and 2's and 10's," Julie said.

"Huh." Eric took off his red Matadors cap and tossed it on the kitchen bar. "What's for dinner?"

"Whatever you decide to make us, hon," Tami replied. "You know I have that test tomorrow. I expected you home half an hour ago."

"Breakfast for dinner it is," he said.

"Can you put chocolate chips in the pancakes?" Julie asked.

Eric draped his dark red jacket on the back of his kitchen chair. "Roger that. You want to help me cook?"

Julie smiled and followed him to the pantry.

Tami finally closed her book when he put the plate down in front of her. She cleared her things to the bar.

Eric nodded to Julie when they were all seated again. "You wanna say grace, Monkey Noodle?"

"Good food, good bacon, Good Lord, let's…oh. That doesn't rhyme."

"Amen," Tami said, and dug in. She was clearly hungry. After devouring a pancake and two strips of bacon, she finally asked Eric about his day.

"The new coach is still an ass," he said. Tami glanced rebukingly at him and then moved her eyes to Julie. He winced apologetically. "I can't wait to get out of Macedonia. They're definitely losing their QB coach at Midland High at the end of this season, so…" He crossed his fingers. "Midland next year. I'll keep commuting to privately coach Jason, and then, when he's a freshman, maybe they'll bring me on as Dillon High's QB coach. By the time Jason's a junior - _head_ coach. And when he graduates – _college_ QB coach."

"Ambition _and_ patience," Tami said. "I like that in a man."

"You like that I agreed to stay in Macedonia for another year."

"I do appreciate the compromise." She reached for the butter to lather her last pancake.

"Well, I appreciate you, babe. I appreciate all your support all these years."

She smiled. "Why were you late getting home today? Traffic?"

"We'll talk about it later."

Tami raised an eyebrow.

"Because I want to talk about _your_ days," Eric said. "Tell me about school, Monkey Noodle."

"Deacon had to stand with his nose in the corner," Julie said. "And Emily had to sit out recess. Tyler got sent to the principal's office."

"Julie, honey, what did I tell you about gossiping?" Tami asked. "Do you remember that conversation we had yesterday?"

"What did you _learn_?" Eric asked.

"Nothing."

"You must have learned something," Eric insisted.

Julie seemed to think for a minute. "Nothing I didn't already know."

 **[*]**

When Julie was settled in bed for the night, and Eric and Tami were settled on the couch, Tami asked him once again why he'd been late. He stood up and retrieved a manila envelope from his gym bag. "Because I was picking up these results."

He tossed the envelope on the coffee table. She leaned forward to pick it up while he sat stretched out an arm across the back of the couch behind her.

"Results to what?"

"I went to that fertility clinic last week."

"You did?" They hadn't talked about it for a long time, not since before the miscarriage. "When did you manage that?"

"That Saturday when you were in class. I left Julie with the neighbor."

She pulled out the sheet of paper that was inside the envelope.

"And I only thought of you, babe. Only you."

She snorted. She scanned the information, looking for something that made sense.

"Perfectly normal sperm count," he said.

"Then what's wrong? There must be something wrong with me the doctor missed."

He shrugged. "Or maybe it just wasn't meant to be."

She dropped the paper on the table and settled back against him. He draped his arm around her shoulders. "I've been thinking," he said. "Coaching. It's like I have a gaggle of sons every year. And sometimes they come over for dinner, and you work your magic…and they open up to you. So it's like you have sons too. And maybe…maybe we were only meant to have one kid at home, so we could have more time and energy for _all_ our kids."

She nodded. "Maybe so."

He leaned down to kiss her. "I think God knows what he's doing."

"So…do you want me to go back on the pill?"

"Why? Do you want to?"

"No. But what if I _do_ get pregnant one random day?"

"Then we'll welcome that gift."

 **[Eight Years Later]**

Those kids. They didn't understand. They were fifteen, sixteen, seventeen. They didn't know what it was like to be a man who had worked his entire adult life for just one real break, who had packed up his family five times for the better opportunity, who had clawed his way through all the competition, who still had a dream of being at least half the success he'd once imagined he could be when he was eighteen.

They didn't understand. To the Panthers, he was just a selfish traitor.

Coach Taylor walked into the hotel room and picked up the towel that his wife or maybe his daughter had just let lie on the floor, a thing discarded. His players felt like that, he knew. A thing discarded. He tossed the towel on the dresser.

"You all right?" Tami asked.

He sighed. "Yeah," he lied. He put a hand on his daughter's head, turned down her offer of chocolate, and walked out onto the balcony. He gripped the railing, the way his father always had in the front row of his high school football games when things got tense. He leaned forward and breathed. He felt like he wanted to vomit. He was doing the right thing, wasn't he? _College_ football. The thing they'd been working toward for years.

He felt Tami's hand on his back. "You all right babe?" she asked.

He straightened up and nodded. Another lie.

She didn't believe him. "I saw that news came out." The news that he was leaving the Panthers for TMU.

He opened up to her, as best he could. "Hell, I tried talking to those kids. Those kids don't understand."

"You're a good man, babe."

He looked away from her. He loved and hated it when she said that. He loved it because he'd never stopped longing for her approval, but he hated it because she said it when she knew he wasn't _feeling_ like a good man.

"Honey," she said, "I've got something I've been meaning to tell you all day, and I just haven't been able to, and it's the worst…it's the worst timing."

He turned to look at her. It wouldn't be the first time she'd had poor timing. But what could this be?

"I know we haven't talked about this in a long time…"

He stared at her. _What? What haven't we talked about in a long time?_

"…and I just don't know how you're going to take it."

 _Take it? It's something to be taken?_

"I'm pregnant."

She had to be joking. "What did you say?"

"I said I'm pregnant."

Was she joking? He smiled. It was too cruel to be a joke, but it couldn't be true, could it? After all these years of infertility, how could it be? "You're pregnant?"

"Really."

That was a dream, like playing for the NFL, that he'd simply written off. He'd completely wiped that hope from his slate. "You're pregnant? As in you're going to have a baby pregnant?"

She smiled faintly and nodded. She was scared. He could tell. They'd last talked about this eight years ago. They'd agreed they would always be open to the possibility, but then time and life had rolled on. If his feelings on the matter had changed, she wouldn't have any way of knowing. She was scared about what his reaction might be. It must be true, if she was scared to tell him.

He could feel the joy mounting, the heavy burden of the evening lifting, but he couldn't let it out. Not yet. It was too good to be true. "You look me in the eye and you tell me that."

She laughed. He laughed. It _was_ true. This was happening. "Okay, honey," she said, looking him in the eye, "We're going to have a baby."

She stroked his cheek and said something. He didn't hear what. He didn't care what. It was too much, too good, for a dream to come true, years after he had given up dreaming it.

The laugh erupted.

He kissed her. His wife. The mother of his child. The mother of his _children_. "I luuuuuhhhhhhhve you."

 **[*]**

When Eric came to Tami after winning the State Championship, and he said that "this little one" had him thinking and that "there are more important things than football," she knew what he was going to suggest. He was going to give up his dream for his family, the way his own father had done when he'd left the AFL for his wife. Eric's father had kept that a secret for years, had let his wife believe he hadn't been picked up after the merger. At least Eric was giving Tami a chance to say no.

And she _did_ say no. They hadn't worked this hard and moved this many times so he could settle for coaching high school. If he gave up his dream for her and their children, the resentment would come out somehow. Eric's own father had tried to force him to fulfill the dreams he hadn't. What if Tami was pregnant with a son right now? What if Eric gave up this college job, and then did the same thing to his own son? Or what if he came to resent Tami? She wasn't going to risk it.

Tami thought, too, of her friend Angie's advice so many years ago, when Eric got his first job offer – "If you don't let him take this job, he's going to feel emasculated…Don't turn him into that boy. You won't like him." This was the vision he had pursued for so long. This was his big break, and there was no way she was going to throw up a roadblock on the way to it.

"There is nothing more important to me than you," he said.

Tami nodded. She believed he meant those words, but she also believed that giving up his dream could negatively transform him.

"So here's what we're going to do." Eric outlined his plan to stay in Dillon. "And that's the way it is," he said decisively. "Yes?" It was a question, but not really.

"No!"

"What do you mean no?"

"You've got to go to Austin! This is your dream!"

"That's what I'm telling you though! You are my dream! This baby is my dream! Julie is our dream! I'm living my dream right now!"

It reminded her of what she'd overheard Mr. Taylor say, when his wife told him football was his life: "You were my life. You still are." But Tami was not Eric's mother. She was stronger. And their marriage was stronger – more honest, more open, more equal. She wasn't afraid of temptations or distance. "I don't want to be responsible," she insisted, "nor do I want this baby to be responsible, for you not living out your dream." Hadn't that very fact affected Eric's relationship with his father? She wasn't going to let that happen.

"And that's what I'm saying! You ARE my dream!"

"I have walked with you all these years to get to this place." From Houston to San Antonio, from San Antonio to Dallas, from Dallas to Macedonia, from Macedonia to Midland, from Midland to Dillon they had walked hand in hand – each football team bigger and better than the last – one long trail to the goal post of college coaching, to the dream he'd established for himself at the age of twenty-one. "You and I together!"

She had her dream too, here in Dillon, and she wasn't giving it up for him, but nor was she letting him give up his dream for her.

Why should _either_ of them have to give up a dream? Why should marriage require one side to give up? For years, Betty Taylor had, according to her counselor, "sublimated" her desires, and Mr. Taylor had surrendered his dream, but it didn't have to be like that. This was a new generation.

It was a different time.

They could have it all.

 **THE END**


End file.
